


Dream Child

by muchadoloo



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, American Sign Language, Angst, Bonding, Din Djarin Needs a Hug, Fantasy, Fate & Destiny, Gen, Hurt Din Djarin, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Reveal, Mandalorian Adoption Culture, Outcast Din Djarin, correction: platonic/familial soulmates, he's as soft as i want him to be, traumatic mutism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:54:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 27,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28959012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/muchadoloo/pseuds/muchadoloo
Summary: It is an old Mandalorian proverb that a child is born in one's dreams.For over twenty years, Din has dreamed of fire and smoke, bloodshed, and bloodcurdling screams. They say it’s a bad omen. They say he's fated to be childless. They say he has no dream child.What he does have, however, is a persistent green creature who sneaks into his ship, eats all his food, and refuses to leave him alone.(In which, all Mandalorians receive recurring dreams of their intended foundlings and Din just so happens to be the exception to that rule).
Relationships: Din Djarin & Grogu | Baby Yoda
Comments: 85
Kudos: 197





	1. Part I.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AsunaChinaDoll](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsunaChinaDoll/gifts).



> **A/N:** For anyone who's read my previous stories, this is psychology-meets-familial/platonic soulmate au. For all you psychology junkies in particular, this story draws on Erik Erikson's Psychosocial Development Theory (i.e. Childhood Development Stages), trauma-informed care, attachment theory, adoption culture, and specific recovery practices for traumatized children. It also draws on Brene Brown's work on empathy, belonging, and the loss-joy continuum.
> 
>  **Mini Intro:** When I tell you I've gone back and forth on whether to write this story or not...GOODNESS. I decided to throw all caution to the wind and write the Mandalorian story of my dreams (no pun intended). The result: a whacked-out fic, messing around with Mandalorian adoption culture while trying to subvert toxic masculinistic views about childlessness (there are men or male-identifying people who want kids, face infertility, struggle with the difficulties of adoption). If you're wondering: yes, this is what I do when I have too much time on my hands. At the end of the day, this fic is entirely self-indulgent.
> 
>  **Brief trigger warning(s):** implied child abuse (nothing overtly explicit or graphic, but the abuse is implied), implied neglect, childlessness. For any/all who've experienced (or are currently experiencing) infertility or childlessness. This fiction work is not meant to sensationalize childlessness for entertainment purposes or uphold child-rearing/child-bearing as the highest good. If you have any concerns, please message me.
> 
> I am also not a licensed child psychologist or clinician (merely one who is studying to be).
> 
> If you want to listen to a list of songs that inspired this fic, I've created three playlists: [Din's Soundtrack,](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWaTIPiUwu6LqGuzS4oLyhmQroAoee9U9) [Grogu's Soundtrack,](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWaTIPiUwu6K6zYbRjR7gJu1AzzC6mpkI) [The Father & His Son Soundtrack.](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWaTIPiUwu6IUHbY4Y7cl8geX-xMYB84i)
> 
> Choose your own adventure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Important note(s):** Din is around the age of Pedro Pascal; he's in his forties here. Also, Din is still a part of the Covert in this story; he just spends most of his time bounty-hunting. Lastly, the kid is referred to as an 'it' in this chapter (since Din doesn't know the child's sex). I am not advocating for calling a child 'it' but Din calls the kid that in S1/E2-3, so that's what we're doing for this chapter.
> 
> Abundant thanks to China ([@AsunaChinaDoll](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsunaChinaDoll)) for helping me finetune this universe, enduring the tyranny of editing, relieving my stress by beta-ing this chapter, and honestly just putting up with my nonsense. This chapter (honestly, this whole story) is dedicated to your beautiful self. You're still a babe.

* * *

** Part One **

* * *

Din is decapitating a rogue Gen’Dai on Florrum —and steadily watching the creature’s head grow back— when the comm message appears on his HUD: _A Finding speech is in 48 solar cycles. Your presence is requested._

It’s enough to force him to a hard stop, arm hanging limply at his side like that time he injected it with nullicaine to piece out a cylinder fragment. The news is like that — numbing to read. The _impact_ of the news is like the cylinder fragment — jarring to receive. _Stars above,_ Din wavers on his feet. _Someone in the Covert has found_ —

Blaster flares strike Din’s armor, sending him stumbling back. The Gen grins at him, looking like a kark on sanna spice. Its teeth are not finished regenerating, but they’re still sharp enough to maim.

“Your beskar will make a fine trophy on my wall,” the Gen says, voice like grated rock salt.

The birth pangs of another dustbowl blast through them and Din grits his teeth against the sand that’s managed to sift through his flight suit, scraping against his skin. He has mere minutes before the surge begins again. He needs to finish this.

Din’s body takes over, forcing as many wounds as he can through the Gen’s armor and into its corded muscles. Adrenaline blurs his movements until Din can barely hear himself breathing. _Come on,_ the words keen against his lips as he launches two daggers into the creature’s torso. He doesn’t wait for the blow to register before swiping across the Gen’s throat. Its green spurts and Din grimaces, feeling the blood ooze down his helm.

Deadweight thuds to the sand.

Din rights himself, heart pulsing in his ears. Seconds pass before other sounds filter back in: wind, whistling against his armor; his breathing, ragged and dry; the Gen’s cloak flapping in the breeze. Green drips off Din’s armor as he approaches and puts three rounds in the creature’s chest just in case. The body heals around the blaster wounds, but the Gen doesn’t rouse. Unfortunately, it’s not dead (no one can kill those red-eyed bastards), just hibernating.

Din takes his time gathering up his knives, conscious of the comm message still flashing in the corner of his display. He doesn’t want to look at it. _Not yet._ He eyes the Gen’s body instead, needing the distraction. It’ll take a solid hour to get the creature onto the Crest; another just to get it in carbonite. The handling and off-loading will take a minute and then, he’ll still need to run his absence by Karga, who will undoubtedly give him the time off (he’s been hankering for Din to slow down for years). It’s a pity that getting clearance isn’t the problem.

The message blinks on the screen, redlined now, and Din finally looks at it with a huff. _A Finding speech is in 48 solar cycles. Your presence is requested._

 _48 solar cycles._ By Nevarro’s metrics, that’s two days.

The mark on Din’s wrist itches with the information and he clenches his jaw, refusing to scratch it. They've given him just enough time to make it back, but not nearly enough time to prepare himself. 

Something that isn’t quite anxiety nor anticipation twists in Din’s gut as he hoists the Gen’s body onto his back and starts the trek. The sun is setting, returning in orbit, and Din wishes his return could only be so seamless. He’s obligated to attend the ceremony to listen to the speech, extend his well-wishes, and see the new foundling. It is the Way.

But Din’s never been skilled at hiding his grief. It’s why he took the role of _beroya_ in the first place (“Hunting,” he’d told them, though he was really just escaping). But now, they’re asking for his immediate return and for good reason.

A Finding speech can only mean one thing: someone has found their dream child.

✵

They call them _venku’la ade:_ Dream children.

No one knows exactly when the dreams began. Some say the dreams emerged out of the failures of the Dark War: when their clans were cast like fragments into the galaxy. Others, who hold to the old religious ways, attribute the visions to Kad Ha’rangir: the god of destruction, change, and re-birth, and a happenstance of blessing on his part. Then, there are those like Din’s _buir_ , who credit the dreams to the infinite wisdom of the universe (“The universe is perfectly balanced _,_ ” the old man used to say. “Much death must be matched with an abundance of life. Something lost, another thing given”). The old man thought the dreams emerged from the ashes of war — an attempt of the universe to remedy the mass displacement and bloodshed that years of destruction had caused. Mandalorians were chosen because they knew survival’s sting as both hunter and prey. Of course, the dreams would visit their people.

But for pragmatists like Din, facts outweigh fables and origin stories. The fact is: long ago, they were visited with dreams of particular foundlings spread out across the galaxy; children who were the first casualties of war. _Their_ intended foundlings. Some of their kind received multiple dreams — evidence that they were assigned multiple children; others received only one dream. The dream could be anything — a snippet of the foundling’s current activities, a snapshot of their life, a memory from their childhood— but in all cases, the same dream returned to them over and over again, replaying until they found their child. Only then did the dream finally leave them.

Din’s _buir_ received dreams of him (“A full-faced boy with a smile brighter than all three of Aris’ suns combined”). The old man’s appearance on Aq Vetina was by mere happenstance. They were quelling a siege, disrupting oppression, but somehow he stumbled upon him. _His venku’la adiik._ Din had never seen the old man before; he’d never received dreams about him either. There was only a vague sense of familiarity when his _buir_ drew him into his arms; a sense of being known when he looked at him; a call towards home when he said Din’s name.

(His _buir_ wasn’t a sentimental, superstitious man —in more ways than one, he was stoic, practical, and impassible to onlookers— but with Din, he displayed a tenderness that seemed almost too vast for one man. It was odd: he, a seasoned warrior, somehow softened by a scrawny child with eyes too big for his face.)

The old man longed for the day when Din would receive dreams of his own. When he, like all of their kind, would be visited with a dream after his twentieth year. His _buir_ died before the dream arrived and truthfully, Din’s grateful he wasn’t around to see it happen. He doubts he’d find any semblance of the pride that once gleamed in the old man’s eyes.

Din is older now, almost middle-aged; he is much too old for childish stories. He wouldn’t call himself an unbeliever, just a time-worn skeptic who’s found loopholes in absolutes. His _buir_ failed to mention that not everyone is so fortunate to receive a dream child. Or that not all dreams are shiny and bright and filled with promise. Sometimes the universe isn’t balanced; sometimes it fucks people over; sometimes a person’s dreams are more like nightmares. The old man forgot to mention those exceptions. Or maybe, he just didn’t imagine Din would be one of them.

The fact is: once sworn to the Creed, all Mandalorians receive dreams of their intended foundlings after their twentieth year (never _before_ and never after their thirtieth). It is the Way of their people.

The fact also is: Din just so happens to be the exception to that rule.

✵

Nevarro is brighter than the last time Din visited.

Karga had relayed the news once before: how a small gang of do-gooders had sacked the seediest inhabitants from the planet, turning the old bounty-hunters’ hive into a respectable town. Din hadn’t believed it then. Looking at the marketplace, he still isn’t sure he believes it now.

A band of children weaves around the tables, giggling as they brush past him and Din slows, watching them beg in front of a booth selling sweet bread. _A wonder of wonders._ He can’t remember seeing children above ground, neither can he remember stations selling sweets when he first lived in the Covert. Too much fear suffocated the people then, taking innocence and luxuries with it. _How things have changed._

Adult voices call through the marketplace clamor, but the kids seem too busy licking cinnamon paste off their sticky fingers to respond. Din watches them race away again, sending ripples through the crowd. It’s an unusual sight, but he shouldn’t be so surprised. Peace always leaves such generous bounties.

Cinnamon lilts in the air as Din passes by the booth and onto another side street that’s arguably less noisy than the last one. Baked _hurdue_ is displayed at a station to his left, warming under the same heating lamp that used to function as a drug cooker. It probably isn’t safe, but Din doubts anyone cares if the size of the lines are anything to go by.

Some residents eye him as he passes, but most seem too busy conversing to be bothered with his presence. A Keredian bumps into him, sending Din back to steady his hand on a booth table. A biting remark is on his tongue when another voice too sarcastic and smart-assed for Din not to recognize rolls behind him.

“Well, well, well. Look what the cathorn dragged in.”

Din turns to see a mop of copper curls, peeking over a mound of old spacecraft parts, and he sighs. “Peli.”

“Mando.” She gives him a once over. “Ya look like shit.”

Din wants to counter that her booth looks like shit, but she’d only take it as a compliment.

“It’s been a while. What’re you— _Hey_!” Peli trips over a case of surgers to snatch a motivator out of a droid’s clasps. “Touch that again, Treadwell, and you’ll be trash kindling the next time I see you.”

The droid’s eyes slump as it wheels away. Peli rounds on Din with an eye roll.

“Ya see, that? I can’t even get good help around here anymore,” she says.

Din smiles as he watches her shine a lug nut with a dirty cloth, as dismissive of his presence as she always is. He could be gone for a century and Peli would never ask him about it, probably because she could care less.

Din surveys her booth. “I thought you were on Tatooine.”

“Ya thought right, tin can.” Peli tosses the lug nut on the table with the air of one who’s given up on something useless. “Sandstorm season always manages to put a skank in the skudpie though — if y’know what I mean. So, I’m here for the offseason.”

She angles around the booth, flipping over the ‘Open’ sign with her boot, even as a Caphex approaches.

“Hey! Read the sign. We’re closed, kitty-cat.”

The hairs on the Caphex’s face bristle before the buyer stalks away, mumbling under their breath.

“Womp rat,” Peli insults, watching them go. She waits until they’re out of sight before she turns back to him, eyes aflame. “Now, the real question is: what’re you here for? And don’t lie. You’re not good at it anyways.”

The words are on his tongue and yet, Din still feels a knot lodge itself in his throat. He swallows, but the knot just thickens to spite him. There’s too much emotion clamped down in his gut — enough to fill an ocean and speaking the reason for his presence would only drown him.

“Sometime today, Mando.” Peli snaps her fingers.

“A Mandalorian has located their foundling.”

Peli’s eyebrows nearly fly up to her hairline. “You mean, the dream thing you all go on about?”

Din hums his assent, not trusting his voice.

“ _Maker…_ ” Peli breathes and it’s unusual to see her so taken aback. “I mean, that’s great n’ all, but… why do you have to be here?”

“I’ve been summoned. All of us have. It would be…rude not to offer my regards.”

“If you say so.” Peli rolls her eyes.

Someone laughs from the booth next to them and for a second, Din feels strangely out of place with his dark armor and flight suit still smelling of the Gen’s green. The marketplace is so lively now. Yet, he stands in the midst of it all like a dark shadow hovering over an otherwise pleasant day.

“What about you?” Peli keeps her eyes on the street, but even Din knows she’s not really looking at anything.

“What about me?”

Her eyes find him then and she sighs. “So, they haven’t changed. Those dreams of yours.”

“No.” Din looks away. “They won’t.”

She nods, thrusting her thumbs through the loops on her tool belt, trying and failing to hide her disappointment. It’s still unusual for Din — knowing someone knows about his nightmares. Din told her about them once and not by choice. She’d caught him on the tail-end of one of them and the sight was bad enough to make her knock a few credits off his bill — something she _never_ did.

“Well, I have something that might help you out. For a finder’s fee, of course.” Peli winks, slinking under the booth at a crouch. Items clatter behind the curtain, drawing several eyes toward her station. “A Melbu…needed me to fix…her alternator, so I— _What the hell is this_?”

She pops out from behind the curtain, holding what looks like a fried biocell. “Treadwell, if I find out you’re trying to up your processing chip again, you’ll be Bantha fodder for all I care.” Peli huffs, turning to Din as she rummages behind the curtain again. “ _Anyway_ , that alternator was older than dirt. Took me weeks to fix. Had to up my rate, so she — _dammit, where is it?—_ threw in a few of these babies to cover the difference.”

With a laugh of triumph, Peli wrenches her arm free, brandishing a bag of wilted, unimpressive-looking flowers.

Din frowns. “You fixed an alternator…for _flowers_?”

“What — you never seen Millaflower before?” She sucks her teeth when his silence betrays his ignorance. “Sheesh, get out more, will you?”

“What does it do?”

“Whaddya think, dung brain? One dose and it's lights out.”

Din tilts his head to the side, suddenly interested. “No dreams?”

“Nope.” Peli leans back against the booth, looking irritatingly pleased, which can only mean she knows she’s got a hand in his pocket.

“How much?” He says with a sigh.

“Depends.” She purses her lips, looking him up and down. “Whatcha got for me?”

Din tosses a pouch on the table.

She rifles through it with a whistle. “Someone’s desperate.”

“Just sleep-deprived,” he grumbles.

“Some would say that’s one in the same, tin can.” Peli slips the pouch into her pocket with a contented pat. “The flowers aren’t complicated, just stick ‘em in a vase.”

“And do, what?”

Her eyes wander away as she picks her teeth. “Hell, if I know.”

Din tosses a Calamari flan on the table.

“Tie ‘em together and keep ‘em in an enclosed space,” she relinquishes, pocketing the money with a glee that’d put even a Jawa to shame. “S’ all I know. I swear.”

Din frowns at the flowers. He has a feeling they were in better condition _before_ the Melbu had handed them over to Peli. They don’t look well enough to display on a Rodian’s table. Peli is right about one thing though: he’s desperate enough to take them anyway.

“Well, how long’re you here for?” she asks.

Din sighs. “Until the celebration is over. Possibly even before the speech wraps up.”

Peli whistles through her teeth. “Eager, much? I mean, I get it, you people are an odd bunch, but what’s the rush? I’m sure they’ll wanna see your dingy shell again.”

Tension seeps into Din’s shoulders as he gazes beyond the booth to the street leading to the Covert. He doesn’t know how to tell her — that their urgency to see him is exactly the issue. They will ask questions about his presence, about his absence, about him and still, they’ll accept him as they always do. Din is a Mandalorian; he is one of them. But inclusion and belonging are two different things, distant cousins within the same family. The former is like a tenant who invites him inside for pleasantry’s sake, then sends him on his way; the latter asks him to stay awhile and build a home. But Din doesn’t know how to build what he’s never had.

Inclusion is easy; belonging is hard.

“I just have to go,” Din replies, eyes falling away from the street. _Because staying is hard._

✵

It turns out the one who located their foundling is Mauns Gavit and Din takes another sip of his _tihaar_ , knowing he’s going to need it.

 _Gavit_. Of course, it’d be Din’s luck. They hadn’t been on amicable terms since Din replaced him as _beroya,_ and the ex-hunter had never forgiven him for it. _A disgrace to the Tribe_ , Gavit had called the decision. He challenged Din and lost, which only made the animosity worse. Gavit was one of the few who still held to the old, traditionalist ways — when a Mandalorian was only as authentic as the dreams that visited them. He’d made it clear on many occasions that Din was less than legitimate.

Din takes another swig (the spirit is potent enough to degrease an engine and yet, he’s sure he’s going to need something stronger), the chin of his helmet lowering as he watches Gavit drone from the platform.

“…we are the harvest of our ancestors’ dreams. Their dreams live on in us,” Gavit recites, sounding as self-important, pretentious, and _redundant_ as he did the last time Din saw him. “It is true that it’s hard for us to find our _venku’la ade_ , but our people are well acquainted with difficulty. Our refusal to concede to surmounting challenges is what makes us Mandalorians. It is what makes us great. For generations, we’ve found a way to be united with our foundlings, even if it means combing through the galaxy for months, for years, for decades. Their safety and survival depends on our determination, so we do not give up. We do not give in. Perseverance always rewards the strong and recently, it rewarded me with one of my own foundlings. This one, Syvenna.”

A girl with hair the color of Florrum’s sand stumbles onto the platform, immediately running to hide behind Gavit’s legs. Din only needs to take one look at her to know she’s overwhelmed.

Gavit asks her to say a few words and Din bristles at the suggestion, even more so when the girl inches further out of sight. It’s unwise to demand that she speak and address a people she does not yet know. _It isn’t their Way._ The Finding speeches Din attended in the past were intimate and solemn, holding both festivity and memorial in tension. They celebrated the preservation of innocent life while mourning the circumstances in the same breath. The message such ceremonies sent was clear: this isn’t the time for foolish rejoicing — not when a child had to lose their parents for such adoption to take place.

Din can’t say the same about Gavit’s ceremony.

“Let’s return to the festivities.” Gavit raises a cup. “To the foundlings — who are the future.”

Glasses raise over a host of helms. “To the foundlings!”

Din’s mug only comes off the table so he can down the rest of his drink before leaving. He said he’d attend and he has. In and out.

He’s standing —pushing the chair back to gather up his rifle— when a trio crashes around his table, settling against the wall. It’s too crowded for Din to slide past them without drawing attention to himself. He sits again, frowning.

“…lucky guy.” Someone — _female_ — says. Din doesn’t recognize her voice, neither does he know her armor. _A newcomer._ “Must be nice finding his little one on Morak. My Finding cycle isn’t up for another five months. Can’t look for my kid until then.”

“Found one of mine on Naboo. Wasn’t as hard as I thought.” _Jael_. He always speaks in stunted sentences.

“That’s because the tunnels gave it away.” _Vizsla._ Din’s grip tightens on his cup. Now, he really needs to leave.

“What about you?”

Before Din can wonder why no one’s responding, the newcomer leans over his table with a force that sends the wood rocking.

“You’re the _beroya,_ right? I’ve heard you’re good.” She leans in, looking interested. “So, what does your dream show? Or _dreams_ , if you’re as lucky as that guy over there?” The newcomer thrusts her thumb at Jael.

Vizsla steps forward, gaze flashing to Din. “I don’t think—”

The newcomer bats him away in a manner that leaves Vizsla visibly stunned. She’s either never heard about his parentage or simply doesn’t care.

She helps herself to a chair next to Din. “Tell me about ‘em.”

Vizsla and Jael stiffen behind him and Din has never wanted to leave as much as he does now (it’d be a sign of cowardice though — to walk away when someone’s asked him a direct question). This is why he’d planned to slip out before the speech was over.

“Hey!” The newcomer taps on the table. “What’s yours like? When’s your cycle period?”

He doesn’t know how to tell her —doesn’t _want_ to tell her— that he took his name off the cycle roster long ago. There’s no point in going out to search for something he doesn’t have.

“Alright, I won’t push.” She laughs, taking his silence to mean reticence. “What does your kid look like then?”

Din resists the urge to scratch his wrist. “I…don’t have one.”

The response receives no laughter this time and instinctively, Din eyes the door again. He knows this conversation —the grilling questions, the wave of shock, the suggestions— like the back of his hand. He’s counting down the seconds until the newcomer formulates another question; he refuses to give her the opportunity. He rises from the table, chair screeching back.

Vizsla steps forward. “Djarin—”

“Enjoy your time.”

Din slips through the crowd before any of them can stop him, but their voices carry. _Her_ voice does.

“What do you mean he has no dream child?” he hears the newcomer shrill. A handful of shushes hurry to quiet her, but it’s no use. “Everyone has a…”

The cacophony of chatter drowns out her voice, but it’s not enough to erase her words from Din’s mind. _No dream child. No dream child. What do you mean he has no…?_ His heart is in his ears, having a conversation with his shame, telling him that leaving is good. It’s always easier to run. _But that’s not what he’s doing_. Mandalorians don’t run away. For some reason, that protest only dials up the conversation, his heart and his shame commiserating together now.

Din heads for the door, pushing through a group too buzzed to protest being pushed aside. The exit is within reach. He’s almost— 

“Djarin.”

Din clenches his jaw, stilling. “Gavit.”

Someone turns up the lights, causing the brightness to glint off Gavit’s cuirass. He’s upgraded to match the gold on the rest of his armor — _the color of vengeance—_ but it’s just an eyesore.

Gavit stands up taller and Din doesn’t have time for this.

“I hope you aren’t planning on leaving. Not when you’ve only just arrived.” Gavit glances between Din and the door. “If I didn’t know better I’d think you’re trying to run off again.”

“Do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Know better?”

They’re too old to be playing this childish game and yet, they slip into the dance of it so easily, without thought, without resistance.

Gavit steps forward with the precision of one who knows when and where to strike. “How’s that mark of yours? Has it changed?”

Din’s hands close into fists.

“I see…” Gavit says with a hum. “My condolences, brother.”

“My regards,” Din grits out, nodding at the little girl ( _Syvenna_ , his memory corrects, but it feels wrong to say her name, even in his mind; a name is an intimate thing and she does not yet know him). It’s his best attempt at regaining peace — for the foundling’s sake.

The girl is in the corner, nearly-shielded by a circle of their kind. She’s scarfing down a date cake with the energy of one who hasn’t known a consistent meal in years. Din recognizes the behavior; he was like that once.

Gavit follows his gaze. “Foundlings are the future.”

“They are.”

A snort responds back.

“Does something amuse you?”

“You,” Gavit replies. “You never say the words. I must say, I find it disappointing. You are one of us, are you not?”

“You know I am,” Din bites out.

“Then, say it.”

Gavit’s helm dips dangerously close to his own and the goad is so disappointingly familiar Din almost laughs. It’s the beginning of a challenge and Din wants to shoot him for being so stupid. A challenge, at this time? In front of his new foundling?

“Say it.” Gavit’s helm clinks against his own. “Or are you just a coward?”

Din stiffens at the remark. “I—”

“Gavit.” Someone butts in. _Sif_ , Din recognizes the armor. “You’re a hard man to find. I just wanted to share how pleased I am for you.” She turns to Din. “Djarin. It’s good to see you.”

Din only manages a nod.

“What were you two discussing?” she asks, but Din can hear the edge in her voice, telling them to ‘pull their shit together’. She’s always been the first in the Tribe to sniff out dissension.

Gavit regards Din with a pleased hum. “Just how much fun we’re having.”

Din sinks his teeth into his tongue if only to keep himself from saying something he’ll regret. _Think of the ceremony. Think of the foundling. Think of flying away soon._ They’re good reasons as any to keep composure, but Din’s just barely holding on to reason.

“Well, don’t have too much fun without the rest of us.” Sif eyes them warningly before nudging both of their helms.

She departs, leaving them to stand in tension again.

“Well?” Gavit faces him.

Din presses his lips together.

“I’m wait—”

“Stop this,” Din hisses, eyes catching on the little girl. _For her sake._

The girl is picking the nuts out of a piece of _uj’alayi_ now, flicking them onto the floor. She disappears out of sight —someone must be chastening her— and she returns a heartbeat later. More nuts go sailing. A weak smile pulls at Din’s lips. She’s spirited, _bolder_ than he gave her credit for. _That’s good._ _It’ll make her great._

“As you wish,” Gavit says. “But you _will_ stay with the Covert longer than a few days? At least for a few weeks.”

 _Weeks?_ “I won’t be—”

“I am the host. You will stay.”

Din’s fingers bite into his palm, only just realizing. _So, this is what the interception was about…_ The superficial concern. The questions (“I hope you’re not planning on leaving”). They both know no one can circumvent the request of a host. If Gavit’s “asked” him to stay, a refusal would only be translated as an insult (one the Tribe would not so easily forgive). _But if he stays_ … Gavit will only make this Finding a personal hell for him.

It’s a choice between public or private shame.

Din can taste blood on his tongue. He’s bitten down too hard. “I…will.”

“Good,” Gavit says with a sneer in his voice, turning to leave. “We have much to catch up on, you and I.”

Din’s too preoccupied with his own thoughts to watch him go, standing stock-still in front of the door that was supposed to be his salvation. In and out. That’s what he promised to do — attend the ceremony, then go. He _came,_ he extended his well-wishes, he saw the foundling, but now…? The door is right in front of him and he can’t leave.

Tension coils around his body, springing him forward and out the door. He’s walking fast enough for the winding corridors of the underground to meld into a brown blur, and the stupidity of it all hits him. _Where the hell will he go? Back to the Crest?_ _For what reason?_

But there is something nipping at Din’s heels, throwing him out the tunnel and into the night air. The chill seeps under his flight suit, biting at his skin, but Din’s eying the shadows and marketplace streets (empty at this time of night), disregarding the cold. How ridiculous he must look — acting like a trapped animal stalking the cages of its pen for an escape point.

There is none.

He’s on the Crest in the span of seconds, sealing down the lift and hurrying into the cargo hold. His boot catches on one of the oscillators and everything he’s been running from catches up with him. He can’t stay. _He can’t._ The only thing keeping him sane is his jobs — having something to do with his hands, his mind, his body. He’s better drifting somewhere. As a bounty-hunter, he’s meant to be an outsider, visiting planets only to track down bounties and receive his reward. He’s meant to be aloof, detached, separate from being-groups and cultures. But to be an outsider among his own people…?

It’s a thought that sends his hands twitching. He needs something to busy himself with. Din unseals the latch on his helmet, letting it clatter to the floor as he begins disassembling. Heat pulsates on his face, syncing in time with a question that’s been following him since he left the underground tavern: _What will you do?_

Din’s fingers fall from the clasps on his collar, leaving his neck open and exposed. _I don’t know._ And he doesn’t. How can anyone know what they didn’t plan for?

The fervor of the ceremony has to die out in a few days. No one, not even Gavit, can keep him past then. Din will need to hunt and they’ll need the money. After all, even celebrations have to die out at some point. The realization calms him enough to climb into the rack, settling onto his side.

The navigation whirs from the cockpit —recalibrating itself— and somewhere, the fuel sensor pings; it’s almost empty. He’s going to need more money. Din turns, a fog beginning to hover over his mind, and the age-old question returns with it: _What will you do? What will you do? What will you do?_

He’ll figure something out. He always does.

————

The flowers are still in his pocket when he sleeps; they’re smushed between his hip and the mattress. He’s forgotten them. Forgotten why he needed them in the first place.

That slip of memory is why _it_ happens.

————

The dream comes to him as it always does — in threes.

First: the stench of burnt flesh.

Second: fear like a hand around his throat, choking him.

Third: Bloodcurdling screams.

Everything is dark — as pitch black as tar (but tar is a lifeless thing and this darkness has a life-of-its-own in the way it chases him, bears down on him, _smothers_ ). His own breathing cuts through it in ragged pants. Like he’s running somewhere. His senses feel like they’ve been amplified, every sensation as close to him as his own breath. Terror claws at his chest; his heart goads him, beating quick and in time. _Run, run, run._ It skips a beat. _No. Hide, hide, hide._

The smell of burnt flesh hits his nose again and he’s going to vomit. Maybe he does because there’s bile on his tongue now. His hands feel slippery and wet with _something._ It’s too sticky to be water. Smells too metallic to be any kind of juice. His stomach flips.

Heat licks at him, no matter how much he inches away. It’s hot, so hot. He feels like he’s burning. Maybe he’s on fire. Maybe he _is_ the fire.

He wants to go home. He doesn’t want to be here. He’s scared. He’s—

Someone’s behind him.

“Found you.”

✵

Din jerks awake like a man crazed.

He gets up too fast, head smacking against the ceiling and his vision splits. Suddenly, there are two grey walls, two compartment doors, four feet oscillating back at him as pain explodes in his skull. The immersion heater kicks on, sweeping the room with heat and it all comes back. The fire. The smell. The screams.

“Dammit.” Din digs the heel of his hands into his eyes. It’s not to stop the pain — only to stop himself from crying, but the tears come anyway.

He stumbles out of the rack, heart racing. The walls, the space… _It’s too small._ _It’s too—_ A sharp pain cuts through his mind, complaining. He needs to stop thinking. It hurts to think. Hurts more to remember… Din sucks in a breath, chest seizing like someone’s sitting on it. He can’t breathe.

“Shit, shit, shit.” Din makes a beeline to the holding casts, wrenching the emergency drawer open.

His fingers rummage through the contents —an empty phial of prenoline, granules of _behot_ in an old sheaf, a dried out cystate— and Din growls in frustration. He doesn’t need to go back to sleep. He needs to calm down. There’s too much adrenaline, too much noise, too much—

He slams the drawer shut so hard a bottle topples, shattering on the floor. He wrenches open another, hands shaking now. Papers go flying. Packets catch on his fingertips. Nails scratch the bottom of a drawer. _Where the hell did he put it?_ He shoves aside an empty vial. _Where is it? Where—_

A brown square peeks out from behind a salve tin and Din shoves the tin aside, piecing out the square from its wrappings. _A nervestick._ There’s only enough to reel his panic back, maybe even dial his heart rate down a few notches. It’s just enough.

Din pops the square into his mouth, chewing as he slides to the ground. It tastes of rotting mallow slop, slimy enough to cling to his throat as it goes down, but the stick will do the job. _It has to._

The heater thrums to life again and Din shrinks back against the wall, trying to dodge its warmth. Heat swells against his face anyway, drying his hair as if trying to reassure him of its good intentions. It’s not the fire. It’s not _that_ dream.

It should be a comforting thought, but Din only turns his face away, feeling grief rise up to meet him.

He remembers the first time the dream visited him. He was twenty-three, fresh out of the Fighting Corps (boasting less aches and pains in his back than he does now) and still learning how to wear his armor instead of letting the armor wear _him_. The dream visited him the night after the graduation ceremony (and every night thereafter), sweeping in on the tails of celebration like a harbinger of bad news.

The Tribe found out about the reoccurring nightmare just weeks after and they, like anyone, searched for answers. Some in the Tribe called it a bad omen; others just didn’t know what the hell to do with it; Gavit, and a few like him, just called Din unworthy. Something _out there_ —the origin of the dreams— had deemed him unfit to rear a foundling. Why else would his dreams be filled with bloodshed and horror, instead of the face of his intended foundling?

Most, though, assumed his dream would change. He was twenty-three; he still had time. But then Din was twenty-four, then he was twenty-eight, then he was _thirty-one_ and the dream still hadn’t changed. No one, as far as they knew, ever received a dream like his — not unless there was something wrong with them.

 _Maybe there is…_ Din doesn’t know. He stopped searching for answers long ago. Questions like _why him?_ only sound entitled and presumptuous. He’s not some petulant child, too focused on their own self-pity and idealism to sit with reality. The ‘why’ doesn’t matter. _Why him?_ Why _not_ him? No one owes him anything.

The worst part though isn’t the precarious nature of his circumstances; it’s not the taunts and jabs from people like Gavit ( _that_ he can handle). It’s not the presence of the dream, but the death of _a_ dream. At one time, Din had wanted a family and a legacy. He’d wanted a _home_ — not walls to run his hands along or a table to sit at, but a person to come home _to._ The desire was lodged in his senses. He wanted a smaller shoe to trip over; a sock (that was too small to be his) that’d made its way into his clothes crate; the sound of someone else’s footsteps ambling around the ship. He wanted what he’d experienced with his _buir_ : belonging. To belong to another just as much as they belonged to him — not in possession, but in care and attachment.

At one time, Din had hoped for all this.

But hope is more violent than war itself. It’s a bloody business — piercing one’s heart and spilling out their desires and longings, only to leave such dreams dying on a cold floor. It asks for everything while promising absolutely nothing. No assurance of any such desires being realized, just fragile, vulnerable _longing._

Din couldn’t hold onto such longings — not without being broken and hurt by them — so he abandoned them and befriended hard realities instead.

The reality is: no foundling has been chosen for him; neither has he been chosen for a particular foundling. He knows that — but knowing a truth and sitting with the truth are two different things. It’s why Din’s always on the move, why he has to get the hell out of here.

_Knowing a truth is easy; sitting with the truth is hard._

Din swipes a hand down his face, sweat and tears slicking his palm. His eyes catch on the mark tattooed on his wrist and for once, he doesn’t look away. The symbol stares back at him, telling him who he is.

Din Djarin. A clan of one.

✵

“This is not intended to shame you,” The Armorer tells him once as she sanitizes his left wrist and prepares the inking needle.

“I know,” Din says.

For a brief second, he hates her for her ability to intuit so much. For pulling on a string he’s been trying desperately to keep raveled. She hasn’t even begun tattooing the mark into his skin and Din’s already on the verge of coming undone.

The needle hovers over his wrist, heat humming from the tip, and Din refuses to watch. He already knows what the mark will look like: a mudhorn —a symbol of his first major kill— lodged within an empty circle. _Alone._ All Mandalorians receive their signet-mark by their thirtieth year. It is symbolic: thirty is the number for stability, security, and the expansion of one’s clan. Din is thirty and he’s never felt so unstable.

The needle bites into his skin and Din’s teeth sink into his tongue, drawing blood. His mind is foggy as he catalogs the sensations absentmindedly: copper on his tongue; the drag of the needle, hot, sharp, and insistent; his right hand digging into his knee; an open flame cracking to their left. The sensations swim in his head, but she’s done in minutes. She draws back, leaving his wrist to pulsate with pain.

“You are a clan of one,” she announces as is custom.

“I am.”

“For now.”

It is not hope that goads her, Din knows, but certainty. She is a woman who sees in endless absolutes, even when an exception sits before her.

The Armorer smears a mucus-like salve over the tattoo; it stinks of rotten Thwakaa leaves, seeping through the bandage she wraps around it.

“Many of our kind have not yet numbered their clan.” There’s so much kindness in that statement, but it’s a half-truth. Such people haven’t received their dream yet, but they will. Din received his years ago. He’s already thirty. _If his dream doesn’t change now before the year’s up, it never will. Which means he'll never have..._

Din digs his fingernails into his thigh. It’s a poor attempt to stop his eyes from burning.

The Armorer regards him quietly and what she finds, she speaks aloud.

“You are not an _aruetii_.”

“I know.” Din tugs his sleeve down.

She’s silent, bleeding a warning in the air. He’s being obstinate, even while feigning compliance.

“And yet, you behave as one who believes himself to be an outsider.”

Din says nothing, too focused on fighting the urge to look away. Shame is ill-fitting on a warrior and still, it manages to cloak every one of his actions.

“When is the last time you slept?”

“Last night.” It’s a smartass remark and they both know she should cuff him for it.

“Soundly,” she adds.

Din grinds his teeth. “ _Behot_ helps me sleep well enough.”

“That herb is not meant to be digested frequently,” she warns, filing away her tools. “You know that.”

Again, Din says nothing, but his silence manages to communicate enough. Of course, he knows about the side effects — the irritability, prolonged grogginess, loss of motor control, possibility of liver damage— and he’s willing to risk it. He can’t go through those nightmares again.

“Your dream will change and when it does, you will return to receive your additional marking to number your clan.”

“Yes,” he says, feigning a fracture of her certainty.

“Foundlings are the future.”

“They are.” He can’t bear to say the words because with them comes a painful question: what if he has no foundling? Does that mean he has no future as well? Din doesn’t want to know.

She stands. “This is the Way.”

“This is the Way,” Din echoes, feeling more lost than ever.

————

That was over ten years ago. A month before he was given the role of _beroya._ Din wouldn’t call it a sign. Just… a way out.

————

Din is returning from the marketplace —crates of foodstuffs dangling from the prongs of his rifle— when he realizes someone’s been in the ship.

The crates thump to the floor as he whips out his blaster. His eyes fly to the rack. It’s open — _he never leaves it open_ — with his blanket hanging out of the compartment, twisted and abandoned on the floor. Like someone had tried to wrench it out.

Gun taunt, Din activates his thermal scanner. The room flickers blue and instantly, a smattering of footprints appear. There’s no clear direction, no sign of focused intent. The prints are chaotic, disorganized, and sloppy. Possibly a rookie who clearly doesn’t know what they’re looking for. If Din didn’t know better, he’d think the intruder took up sight-seeing. The fact is he _does_ know better; he’s _seen_ better. No one breaks into a ship to peruse the scenery.

Din eyes the footprints again. The set is the same size — small in width and length— and almost yellow-washed now, which can only mean the intruder skipped out long ago. _But with what?_

Din flings open his weapons console, finding every blaster, launcher, and close-range pistol staring back at him — secure, locked down, and clearly untouched. He’s throwing the tarp off the containers of stored merch, letting the covering pool at his feet. The containers are still bolted down and a quick rifle through just proves what he’d already guessed: they weren’t touched either. A minute later, he’s in the cockpit, only to return back to the hold when he finds nothing there too.

The thermal scanner fizzes out and Din surveys the area again, not knowing what the hell he’s looking at. Someone was clearly in his ship, but they’d taken _nothing_? No weapons, no rations, no goods. His eyes catch on the abandoned blanket and the sight only exacerbates Din’s confusion. Who, in their right mind, would want a dingy old blanket instead of a weapon, or money, or… _anything_ that’s far more valuable?

Din kneels down in front of the rack, running the blanket through his fingers. There are holes, small enough to be pin-pricks, dotting the hem of the cloth. A knife, maybe? But why would someone dig holes _this small_ into a blanket they couldn’t take? He’s seen Jawas with clearer intentions (and they’re as scatterbrained and shifty as they come).

Din rises to his feet, sweeping the room with a tired eye now. He’ll just need to secure his perimeters better, maybe even add a triadic security lock — if he can afford it. Either way, this won’t happen again. Whoever broke into the Crest will know next time that he’s aware of their intrusion. It should scare them away.

No one in their right mind would come back. It’d only be foolish to make the same hit twice. Every thief on Nevarro knows that.

✵

Except one clearly doesn’t because the next time Din returns to his ship, one of the foodstuff crates is empty.

He tracks a trail of half-eaten food, boots crunching over crumbs and abandoned wrappers, and anger stokes in his gut with each step. It’s pointless to turn on his thermal scanner, pointless to carry his gun this defensively, pointless to glance around every corner for a culprit that’s long gone, and yet, he does so anyway.

The same chaotic footprints blink onto the screen and Din’s grip tightens around his blaster. _The same intruder as before._ How the hell did they get inside again?

Din kicks aside a _chuddle_ as he unlocks the clearance feed on the lift. The feed blinks back in binary: **00111**. There must be an error; it’s only showing him the last time _he_ unlocked the ship, but the intruder must have gained clearance. The only way in is through the lift; there is no other entrance. He refreshes the feed again.

 **00111.** _Dammit._

His eyes fall on the trail of food again and something in him deflates. That was at least two weeks worth of food — maybe three if he could’ve stretched it— and now, he’ll be lucky if he can make up the difference with the other crate. He’s barely scraping by as it is and the rest of his funds _have_ to be funneled into the ship for repairs. He’d planned to pay one of the locals to fix it (Peli’s out of the question, considering how little money he has to spend and how exorbitant her prices tend to be), but at this rate, he’ll just have to make the repairs himself, which will set him back another couple of weeks.

It means he’ll have to stay here for longer and be surrounded by Gavit’s boasting. It means he’s stuck.

Din strikes the wall. “Dank farrick.”

It’s the intruder’s fault, and Din means to make them feel the consequences. Thus far, the thief has refused to stay away. _Good._ He can work with that. If their habits thus far are anything to go by, then there may be a sliver of salvation left for him. Suppose he caught them? Then, he could turn them in and collect a reward that might just cover his losses. Nevarro’s a respectable place now, not so easily forgiving to the transgressions of thieves.

All Din needs to do is prepare.

They will come back and when they do, he will be waiting for them.

✵

It seems Din doesn’t have to wait long because the following day when he’s recalibrating the ND-S within the cockpit, something crashes in the hold.

He’s out of his seat and hurrying down the hall in a heartbeat. He slips along the wall, glaring at the drop-down ladder. Stock-still, he listens for a noise — any noise. The immersion heater thrums to life, sending a low hum through the ship. Din tries to listen past it, focusing on sound from below. No such sound meets him and for a second, he’s sure the crash was a figment of his imagination. Then, something clatters below.

_They’re back._

He has one shot at this. If the intruder gets away after realizing they’ve been discovered, they likely won’t come back, which means his redemption will be gone with them. He has the element of surprise for now; it’s likely they have no idea he’s here and Din would like to keep it that way.

It’ll make things less messy and the take-down more effective.

He edges down the ladder, holding up his weight with his arms, so the drop is soundless. His feet barely touch the floor before he’s slipping around the wall adjacent to the privy, blaster in hand. He peeks out from the wall and stifles a curse. Just as he thought the crate’s been tipped over again and as before, _someone’s_ left a trail of wrappers.

From the mound of foodstuffs, something moves. Din sucks in a breath. It’s smaller than he expected, but it’s _there._

It’s now or never.

Din steps out of the dark, intentionally bearing down on the give in the floor. It groans under his boot and the figure freezes. A shadow scurries away. _Not a shadow._ Din stalks forward slowly, blaster extended. _The intruder._

“Come out,” he calls into the darkness.

Silence.

He eyes the furthest wall. The shadow leans and a smile spreads across Din’s lips. _They’re trapped._ The heater flicks off, leaving them in total silence.

“I won’t ask you again,” he says, stilling. “Come out.”

For a second, only the darkness greets him. Then, large eyes gleam from the shadows. _There you are…_ The intruder slinks out and Din’s finger ghosts over the trigger.

“Drop your—”

The blaster almost slips from his hands as the intruder steps into the light. Big, fearful eyes blink back at him.

 _Stars._ Din teeters on his feet. _It’s…a child?_

At least, it looks like a child. It also looks like nothing Din’s ever seen before: eyes the size of a Rodian’s with ears as big as a Lannik’s. But its eyes _aren’t_ pitch-black like a Rodian’s and its ears _aren’t_ flesh colored like a Lannik’s.

He takes a step forward and it backs up against the wall, whimpering. Its eyes fill with tears and a curse is on Din’s lips. _Dank farrick. It’s about to cry._

Din crouches, trying to make himself look smaller. “Hey, _hey,_ I’m not going to hurt you.”

The child eyes the gun.

He holds it up, palm open. “I’m not going to use this.” He deposits it in his holster. “See?”

Wary eyes still watch Din from the darkness and he collapses on the floor, exhaling. _A child. The intruder’s just a hungry child._ He’s not sure whether to feel relieved or dismayed.

The child glances between him and the foodstuffs and Din notices. He looks at the mound of foodstuffs and the kid notices. Din snags a packet with a sigh.

“You hungry?” He tosses it to the kid.

The kid jumps when the food smacks on the ground. It peeks at him from behind its collar, but Din just tucks his feet under himself, intentionally looking away.

“Go ahead. It’s yours.”

He hears the sound of plastic tearing apart a beat later and discreetly, Din watches the kid from the corner of his eye. It’s gobbling down the stuff (he’s pretty sure the food’s a dehydrated starch muffin) with the ferocity of a person starved. It reminds him of the little girl at the ceremony — _the foundling_ — and something in Din saddens.

“What are you doing out here?” he asks, but the child is too busy ogling one of the muffin’s dehydrated berries to bother with him. “Where’s your family?”

It doesn’t respond and Din wonders if he assumed wrong in thinking the kid understands Basic.

“Your… _darda?”_ The kid doesn’t even look up. _So, not Rodian._

Din gives up with a huff. “You got a name, kid?”

Again, it says nothing, gobbling up the last of the muffin with a burp (and a shitload of crumbs scattered around its mouth) instead. Strangely emboldened, it points at the mound.

“You want more?” Din asks with a wince. _Stars above, he’s really trying to give away all his food._

The kid surprises him by nodding.

“You…” He leans in. “You can understand me?”

The kid blows air at him and stabs a finger at the food again, looking annoyed.

Din tosses over two protein loaves in a daze. They land inches away from his boot, but the kid just shuffles out from the shadows and tears the first packet open with its claws.

 _So, the kid does understand Basic…_ Then, why isn’t it speaking? Perhaps the reason lies with him being a stranger? Or, maybe it’s more simple than that: he just scared the daylights out of a child. Why would it speak to him after that?

Guilt gnaws at Din’s gut. “I’m…sorry I frightened you. I thought you were something— _someone_ — else.”

The child pauses, eying him and Din only wonders what it sees? If he truly is an object of fright (it would hardly be a surprise, considering how other beings typically respond to his presence)?

The kid doesn’t shrink back into the shadows though. Instead, it holds out the loaf to him.

“Oh, I…” Din eyes the string of saliva swinging between the kid’s mouth and the bread and tries not to grimace. “No, you can have it.”

The child has the nerve to look relieved and pops the rest of the loaf into its mouth.

Humor bubbles in Din’s stomach, but it’s not strong enough to overpower the dejection waiting in the back of his mind. _He’s back to square one._ The good news is he can give the kid a few more snacks and send it on its way. The bad news is he’s still low on money and he’ll _still_ have to complete the repairs himself.

A belch snaps him out of his thoughts and Din finds the kid waiting in front of him.

He eyes the foodstuffs. “Are you…still hungry?”

The child places a hand on his knee and Din hates himself for jumping. It’s the touch and the gaze — the way the child is looking up at him with something like glee— that’s throwing him off.

Din snags another packet. “Here.”

The kid pushes the food away and pats his knee again. It points at the stuffs and smiles back at him and Din _really_ doesn’t understand now. If the kid isn’t hungry anymore, why does it keep pointing at the food?

“I don’t…I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

The child collapses on the floor with a huff. Din chews on his lip, feeling like he just failed at something important. The misunderstanding shouldn’t matter, neither should it bother him so much. He’s sure the kid’s parents understand what it’s saying. Most parents — at least the ones’ Din’s seen in the Covert— do. They have this way of translating a gesture or series of nonsensical babbles from their toddler with ease. _Years of child-rearing_ , one person had told him. But Din doesn’t have years under his belt; he’s not a parent. More specifically, he’s not _this one’s_ parent. He’s a stranger and thus, he doesn’t understand.

Grief settles over him like a cloud and Din glances between the lift and the child. It should be with its people — back where they understand it.

“I think it’s time for you to head home.” He stands without looking at the child. “You stay. I’ll…walk you back or something.”

He climbs up the ladder, slipping into the cockpit to grab his gun. But when he returns, the kid is gone.

✵

The child doesn’t show up the next day and Din breathes a sigh of relief.

 _Problem solved._ The kid’s back at home, hopefully satisfied for the time being. It’s possible that Din’s ship was just a moment of curiosity. Or some spontaneous playground of the kid’s own making. Maybe it just wanted to eat all his food (which is the most probable reason).

Either way, the kid is gone now and all should go back to normal.

Din can stop worrying about his ship getting broken into.

He can finally focus on leaving.

✵

He’s polishing his rifle with an old grease-cloth when the kid toddles into the hold the next day.

Din freezes. “What are you doing here? How did you get in?” _He didn’t hear the lift open._

The child just wobbles over to him and begins knocking on his boot clasps, making soft _ting, ting, ting_ noises.

“You know this isn’t the way things are supposed to go,” he says to clearly nobody-but-himself because the kid’s too busy playing with his buckle straps now. “Shouldn’t you be somewhere else? Someone’s got to be worried about you.”

He crouches down and the kid takes that as permission to crowd into his middle. It throws him off so bad he almost falls back. The child

“I think it’s best that— _No, don’t touch that_.” Din nudges the kid’s grubby hands away from the explosives on his belt. It eyes him innocently, then reaches for one again. He bats its hand away, knowing this only further proves his point. “What I’m trying to say is, you shouldn’t be—”

The kid skirts behind him and suddenly, Din feels a tug on his cape. He stands to look when an elated shriek meets him.

“Hey!” Din whirls around, feeling a small weight swing off his cape. “I don’t think— _What are you…_ ”

A giggle replies back and Din reaches around himself, swiping the kid off his cape. Somehow even more elated, the little womp rat makes a grab for him.

“I don’t think you should be hanging around here. It isn’t— _Are you even listening to me?_ ”

Round eyes blink up at him from ogling the plated ensign on his glove and Din doesn’t know why he’s so surprised.

“Listen, I need you to—”

Sharp _clink, clink, clink_ sounds —the kid’s nails tapping on the plating— interrupt him.

Din holds the kid out at arms length and says in one pushed out breath: “You should go home.”

The child looks so horribly crestfallen Din has to avert his gaze to hold his ground. It’s no use though. A low, drawn-out whine croons, tugging at him and it’s embarrassing how quickly he folds. His eyes flicker back to the kid, but it only takes one look to know he’s hurt the kid’s feelings. Remorse churns in his gut, but Din doesn’t know how else to say it. The kid being out here — _attempting to play in his ship with him—_ can’t be good for either of them. Din will be gone soon and the child must have a family somewhere. They’re going in two opposite directions. He isn’t going to stay, but the kid refuses to leave.

“Isn’t there someone who looks after you?” Din asks softly. “Don’t you…have someone?”

The kid whines and reaches for him again and Din feels his heart swell.

He really should send the kid away. His ship is a mess, nearly falling apart with its exposed wiring and open panels. He’s working on several projects at once, all of which demand his immediate attention if he wants to finish on time. Ultimately, this is no place for a child.

The dial ticks against the wall and Din glances at it, reading the time and the temperature. **1327 GST :: 40** **°C.** _The hottest and longest point of the day._ It’s a wonder the kid made it out here. Nevarro’s heatwave can send even its own meerkats into hiding. Din’s on the verge of asking the kid how it’s doing all this? How it’s getting around? How it manages to sneak inside his ship? But the questions die on his lips when the dial ticks again, temperature rising.

If he sends the child back now, it could easily die from the heat. _But if he lets the kid stay…_ It might be dangerous. _A child roaming around in an old ship?_ That can’t be good either.

Din looks into the kid’s dark eyes and makes his decision. He sets the kid down and starts toward the ladder, only stopping when he hears silence.

“Well?” Din speaks over his shoulder. “Come on, you little womp rat.”

Behind him, tiny feet stumble to catch up.

✵

“Slow down,” Din tells the kid for the fifth time the following day as the womp rat reaches for another protein loaf. He nudges the bread out of the way. The kid blows air at him and just grabs a salted kell strip instead. 

Din leans back in his chair with a sigh, watching the kid drag another pile of vacuum-packed foodstuffs toward it. Truthfully, he’s not sure how this happened. Sure, he’d given the kid a protein loaf before (which tastes like dried out drokboard on a good day and rotten gruel on a bad day), but that was _one time_. He didn’t really see a problem with it then, but at this rate, the kid’s going to clean him out for the next couple of weeks. 

“No, _one._ I said one,” Din reminds, barely managing to snag the patty from womp rat’s grubby hands. 

The kid frowns at him. Din would have taken it seriously if not for the brown sugar crumbs speckled on the child’s cheeks.

“You’ve already eaten three protein loaves, a shell cup, and that cake.” He’s pretty sure the kid’s also taken a handful of flounut butter (if the fist-sized chunk currently missing in the stick is anything to go by), but can’t bring himself to mention it. “I think that’s enough.”

The child shoves a nutrient bar in its mouth and snags another one mid-chew. Din sighs, stuck between feeling concerned and astounded. To be honest, he doesn’t know if the womp rat’s even hungry anymore? Or, if its just eating for greed’s sake? He has half the mind to ask the kid if its guardians let it eat so much? But he hasn’t heard the kid speak once — not a babble, not a mumble, not a _word._ To ask it a question would hardly receive a vocal response. 

“Hey, careful.” Din jolts forward as the child wobbles to the edge of the table. 

Its barely stable on its feet as it plops down with a hiccup. Din stifles a groan as the kid grabs for a chewstick. He pushes the stick away; the kid pushes _his_ hands away.

“No. That’s enough.”

The child still seizes it, beginning to nibble on the meat.

“If you keep eating that much you’re going to—”

The child suddenly lurches over and vomits in his lap. For a second, Din’s sure a fastener could have dropped in the cockpit and he still would’ve heard it from the cargo hold. He can feel puke seeping into his pants and he _knows_ it will take a while to get the odor out. 

Din looks at the kid; the kid peeks out from behind its collar if only to pay him a nervous glance. 

“It’s… fine.” Din finally says, trying to ignore the stench wafting into the room. He surveys the child instead. “Are you okay?” 

The kid whines, short arms twisting over its stomach.

Din smiles. “Maybe eat slower next time.”

_Next time._ Din almost laughs (and he can’t remember the last time he did that). He has vomit on his pants and less food now than he had before and he said ‘next time’.

_Maybe there will be one._ Maybe he wouldn’t mind.

✵

“Why can’t you just pop out a few sprouts the old fashioned way?” Peli asks one evening while recalibrating a data card with a torx that’s far too big for the slots. She tosses the screwdriver on the table with a curse. “I mean, everything’s still in tip-top shape for you, right? How old are you, anyway? Forty-five? Fifty?”

Din looks up from the bolts he’s been piecing through and fixes her with a glare. “Forty-two.”

“Oh, is that all?” She rolls her eyes. “My point is: it’s not like you’re outta options.”

Din focuses back on the bolts, honestly wanting to talk about anything else, but he knows Peli. The woman’s like a charhound; once something has piqued her interest, she returns to it and pursues it with an insatiability that borders on obsessive. Usually, such an interest is only directed at her droids and ships. It’s what makes her the best mechanic in the parsec and also the biggest pain in the ass.

“Biological children are…chancy,” Din finally says.

“All children are, dumbass.”

“No, I mean…” Din huffs, wanting to stop talking already, but he knows she won’t let him — not when he’s already begun. “To produce a child requires a vulnerability that we are not often afforded. Nine months of rest, supervision, and immobility towards the end. We’re always on the move, hunting and being hunted. It’s a risk some are willing to take, but not all.”

“Meaning?”

“There are…dangers.”

Peli throws her hands up in the air. “What is this — a cliffhanger from Doc Hoc’s holo-series? Get to the meat, Mando.”

Din glares at her, but even he can tell it lacks the necessary heat. He regards her carefully, _hesitantly,_ before inching towards a semblance of divulgence.

“Often, when a tribe is attacked, raiders single out the pregnant women first. They barter with their lives but in the end, they kill them anyway. If that slaughter doesn’t bring a tribe to its knees, the vengeance that follows after usually destroys us. We fracture. If that happened to me…If someone harmed my—” He looks away, tightening his hand around the bolt. “Forgiveness is a concept I am unfamiliar with and mercy…? I would show none.”

Peli is silent, eyes flickering between him and the slots on the data card. The few times she does look at him, the remorse in her eyes is palpable enough to make Din wish he’d never said anything in the first place. He hopes she’s satisfied because now they’re both uncomfortable.

“I see…”

She purses her lips in the way she does when she’s refusing to apologize. It’s one of the reasons Din likes her.

“Foundlings are…” Din swallows, trying to find his voice. “They’re the future.”

He almost tells her that he too was a foundling once, but then he remembers who he is now, where he’s been, and what he doesn’t have, and pride makes him keep silent.

“Well, if it makes you feel any better, I say you got the lucky end of the stick,” Peli says with a snort. “I mean, who in their right mind would wanna raise a baby in this universe anyway?”

She picks up the torx again, mumbling under her breath about the economy within Outer systems (“Tanked for shit, I tell you”), the vigilantes still running around (“That’ll keep you up at night”), and the cost of living (“Y’know how expensive it is to breathe oxygen? The dead have it better”) and all the while, Din hums in understanding if only to hide another thing he almost-but-doesn’t say.

That she’s asking the wrong question. The ‘who’ doesn’t matter. _Can it be done?_ That’s the better question.

✵

The kid speaks a language all its own without ever opening its mouth.

It’s a thought that comes to Din slowly, as gradual as an unveiling from Nevarro’s moon, as he watches the kid roll a gear-shift knob along the expanse of the table. The knob clatters to the floor, the child glances at him, and the thought crests.

“It’s okay.” He tosses his head toward the rolling knob. “Go on.”

The child toddles after it and brandishes the ball with a grin.

Din nods. “I see…” 

The kid drops the knob on the floor, picks it up and drops it on the floor, picks it up and looks at Din again, buoyantly expectant.

He hums, leaning back against the table. “It _is_ a nice sound.”

The child goes back to playing with the knob and Din feels like he’s staring into the full face of the moon now. Like something brilliant has finally been revealed.

He’s spent so much time being confused with the kid —asking it to repeat an action, or show him again what it wants, or apologizing because he doesn’t understand what it’s trying to say. He’s misread looks and misunderstood gestures, but finally he’s beginning to understand: the kid’s language is demonstrative. It sounds like knocking on Din’s helm to command his attention; it feels like tugging on his pant leg or tapping on his boots. The child doesn’t speak, but the way it communicates its wants are loud and direct.

The child speaks with expression and presence, and the language never fails to mystify him. _They couldn’t be more different._ The kid has so many ways of making its presence known, while Din has spent his whole life trying to disappear. The child inserts itself and he always excuses himself. The child is loud (though it doesn’t talk), while he chooses silence. 

Silence is a language that Din speaks fluently. He wakes in silence, assembles in silence, eats in silence, and even pursues his bounties without making a sound (most assume his silence is a result of being solitary for so long, wandering through space alone, but solitude did not force silence upon him. He chose it). Conversation, especially with other beings, is frankly tedious. It’s made up of small-talk and pleasantries and falsities that always end up going nowhere. Din speaks like he hunts — with precision and incisiveness— but people converse to converse. There’s no end goal to it, just an aimless wandering. 

_But the kid…_ It can start a whole conversation with as little as a glance. There’s nothing aimless about it. The kid always knows exactly what it wants.

A pat on Din’s shoulder draws his attention down. The kid is standing on the table, holding the knob up high with an intent that says it’s going to drop it, but its eyes are on Din. _Asking for his attention._

“I’m watching,” he says.

_Because the kid always has his attention now._ He can’t hide the fact that he’s fascinated, in awe of this wonder of a child. He feels strangely riveted. Like the kid’s always on the precipice of doing something great and unexpected. 

The child speaks a language all its own and Din isn’t fluent by a long shot, but he’s learning. He’s learning there’s more than one way to communicate. Between the banks of words and silence, there’s a river of communication that cuts through both extremes. Din’s just beginning to dip his toe in it.

✵

The kid shows up the next day when Din’s yanking  a linear stabilizer out from its supports. The beam whines in protest when it’s forced out of the joints and Din almost tells the damn thing to ‘shut up’. He’s been meaning to replace the beam for months, but something always got in the way (he’d gotten away with it at first, but then his propulsion system started declining days before he landed on Nevarro and now, he either needs to replace it or find a new ship). He’s swaying on his feet as he lowers the beam to the floor when tiny footsteps patter after him. 

Din eyes the kid. “It’s not safe to be near this. Why don’t you sit over there?” He points at the bench across the room.

The child plops down right next to him.

Din sighs, beginning to unfasten the stabilizer’s micro unit. “What the hell…” 

He offloads the log-recorder, micro valve, and pressor, noticing the reddish color bleeding into the casing. Most of its parts have oxidized so badly Din’s surprised the Crest has even made it this long. He won’t be able to salvage the valve, not with the corrosion. He has a feeling the yaw’s as good as shit too.

The sound of nails tapping against steel interrupts him and Din glances up, catching the kid with its hand on the beam.

“Don’t touch that.”

Din returns to the stabilizer; the tapping returns to his ears.

“Hey, I said don’t do that.” He sits up, nudging the kid’s hand off a tube in the beam. The child’s ears fall low enough to brush against its own shoulders and something in Din softens. “If a part bursts, you’ll only hurt yourself.”

The blank look the kid gives him only further proves a thought that Din’s been having for days: it doesn’t care what he has to say. _That would hardly be a surprise._

He’s moving to return to the unit when a hand pats his thigh. The child looks between him and the tube, then points at it. 

“No, you can’t touch that.”

The child blows air at him, fixing Din with a look that leaves him feeling strangely stupid. It points at the stabilizer again, this time dragging Din’s hand over the tube. The kid looks back at him with a questioning look. _Oh._

“That’s the regulator,” he names, drawing a coo out of the child. Din goes back to unscrewing the axle bay. “Let’s just say it ensures I don’t burn to a crisp inside my own ship.”

Another sound reverberates off the beam and Din looks up to see what the kid is pointing at this time. 

“That’s the drive plate.” Din eyes the circular shaped tray that’s only given him problems since he first installed the damn thing. “It’s _supposed_ to keep the propulsion under control.”

Another tap.

Din pays it a lazy glance. “That’s the collator. Deflects toxins.”

The kid points at something else.

“Cowling system. Keeps certain stuff from breaking other stuff.”

An inquisitive chirp.

Din looks at the circuitry, frowning. “I actually don’t know what that is.”

The child coos regardless, thankfully not off-put by his response, and Din feels the ghost of a smile on his lips. He can’t remember the last time he saw wonder on a face. Trying times tend to whittle everything down to survival’s necessities; everything must have a purpose. His people know that more than most. As hunters, they’re always in pursuit of _something_ , fixed on a goal, or a bounty, or a mission. As prey, they are always in hiding, on the run, _being_ hunted. As a consequence, every action must be carefully plotted out (thoughtless decisions can easily get one killed). Everything must be a means to end. The stabilizer is just that — a means to an end (or, at the very least, give his ship enough steadiness to fly) — but the kid is looking at it like it's a marvel all on its own, even though it’s practically useless at this point.

To enjoy something, not solely for its use, but for its own sake is novel. Unusual, but nonetheless special.

Din licks his lips, feeling warmth pool in his gut. “You’re…pretty special, kid.”

The child just leans against him and points to another thing it wants named.

✵

The kid doesn’t show up the next day and Din actually pauses on the lift, scanning the landscape.

Ash belches from the flats, raining down on the black terra and for the first time, concern flashes across Din’s mind. It’s brief and small enough for him to push it back down. He has no claim on the kid’s time nor does he get to wonder where it ran off to? There’s nothing tying the kid to him.

Still, he can’t help but think about the kid’s safety (to be honest, he thinks about the kid’s wellbeing all the time). About how a child so small could find its way out here? It’s hardly safe. But then he has to remind himself that the kid’s comings-and-goings are none of his business. He’s not its guardian or parent. He’s not the kid's _anything._ So, the last person who has permission to be worried is him. 

Din _knows_ that and yet, his eyes still survey the rocky terrain, tracing where the skyline meets the earth. It’s getting late and the kid never comes past sundown. It’s a detail he noticed about the kid several days in — among many others. Like how the child always leaves when he isn’t looking — when he goes to grab something, or use the privy, or replace another part. The kid always disappears at times like that and he always notices.

The sun dips behind the mountains and Din knows he should go in.

One absent day doesn’t mean anything, so there’s no need to make a fuss. The kid will either be back or it won’t. 

✵

Three days go by and the kid still hasn’t made an appearance.

Three days isn’t much, but the absence of tiny feet pattering behind him adds a felt weight to each one of those days. 

_Maybe, the kid’s found something else to pique its interest._ It’s a thought that causes his hands to fall from the ship’s transverter, wiring dangling limply out of the ship’s side. There’s so much to do — so many projects to complete. Yet, in those three days, Din’s barely gotten half of his intended work done, abandoning it just hours in. He’s been too distracted, thinking about the kid.

It might be true — the loss of interest. Children have the attention span of a swamp pup. He’s seen it well enough with the foundlings in the Tribe. They can pick up a toy one day and discard it the next. It’s just the way things are. 

The ship was a thing of excitement for the kid, but even new things become old after a while. Din figures that’s why the kid started following him around. It needed something new to pique its interest. _Why else would it trail him?_

Din’s life doesn’t have any glitz or glamour to it, so he knew the kid would eventually skip. 

It was only a matter of time.

✵

Two days pass when Din —randomly, suddenly, for some ridiculous reason— decides to buy a sweet bread.

He sets it on the table (the one where the kid rolls — _used to roll_ — the gear-shift knob off the ledge) and stares at it.

Cinnamon glaze drips onto the table; the bread stares back.

Din leaves, feeling uncomfortably exposed for some reason.

When he returns hours after, the bread’s still there. Untouched.

✵

Another day passes and the bread has started to cave in on itself. Only time has touched it.

The kid still hasn’t turned up.

Din tells himself he doesn’t notice as he goes to find himself something to do.

It’s good for him — having projects to busy his hands with. It only stops being so when he realizes his shadow is the only thing following him around now.

 _Well, shit._ That used to be normal.

✵

The sweet bread’s gathering mold now.

It’s rotting from the inside out and something inside Din goes sour with it. He decides after a while to toss the bread into the incinerator. There’s no trace of it once the incinerator dies down and yet, Din still can’t leave his spot in front of the shoot. He stares into the dark funnel, losing himself in it.

_Why had he bought the sweet bread anyway?_ It probably doesn’t matter. The kid’s not coming back and Din knows he should feel relieved. No child should be roaming around a stranger’s ship unattended — not in this universe anyway. Most likely, the kid’s guardians had noticed its absence and told the womp rat to stay put. 

_Good._ The kid needs to be with its family. It _belongs_ with them. To think otherwise would just be…selfish.

But Din _is_ selfish. That’s why he stopped caring if the kid came around. It’s what started him on this road in the first place — waiting on the kid, rationing out food for it, buying it sweet bread.

_Why the hell did he buy the bread?_ Because he was struck by a moment of stupidity? Because the kid has — _had_ — a sweet tooth? Because he had the money (when he really _doesn’t_ )?

_Why?_

Din watches the flames die out, flickering into soft embers, and another thought from deep inside of him whispers: _Isn’t it obvious?_

Maybe it is, but Din’s always been too slow to see things like that —the things that matter— until they’re gone.

Like the sweet bread.

Like the kid.

✵

A week later, Din is wrapping a make-shift conductor patch around a frayed cable when the kid rushes in. His hands snap around the cable so tight it singes his fingers. 

Din clears his throat, sealing the lift with his vambrace. “So, you’re back.” He rummages through the toolbox if only to quell the tide of questions and emotions that threaten to overtake him. He swallows and the tide rolls back. “Why don’t you make yourself useful this time and help me fix—”

The kid barrels into his stomach and Din falls back on his behind. His tailbone complains, but he’s too busy nursing the shock rolling through him (the kid followed him around, sure; tapped on his arm, sometimes; held onto his leg once or twice, but it never hugged him).

His hands waver in the air before they finally settle on the kid’s back. “I guess it’s been a while. I just didn’t expect…” 

A mewl whistles against his armor and Din stills, feeling the child tremble under his hands. His shock quickly turns from bewilderment to concern. 

“Hey.” He tilts his head, trying to catch the kid’s eye. It only burrows deeper into his stomach, a cry vibrating off the padding. Din’s heart leaps to his throat. “Why are you crying? What’s wrong?”

From outside, a blaster flare pings off the ship and Din straightens. A handful more follow, raining down a barrage that rings through the hold and makes the child sink its nails into Din’s forearms. 

“Come on out, you ugly little bug!” A voice shouts from beyond the ship walls. Its effect is like lightning, jolting the child out of Din’s arms to race behind him. “You can’t run.” 

Din’s gaze darts from the kid to the ruckus outside. “Are you… hiding from them?”

Something bangs against the side of the ship. “I said ‘come out’!”

Din’s hands close into fists as he feels the child crowd against his back. Questions rush to the surface, unbidden and forceful. In his mind, he has time to ask the kid about them: _Who’s out there, and why are they after you? Where have you been?_ But there is no time and, by the sound of the blasts ricocheting off the lift, they’re bound to figure out a way inside soon. 

Din rises, gathering up his rifle from the wall. Before he can take a step, something snags onto his cape. The kid stumbles behind him, fist tightened around the fabric.

Din smiles. “I need you to stay here, okay?”

The child shakes its head, eyes filling with tears.

“There’s no need to worry about me. I’ll be fine.” Din snaps the rifle to his back and crouches. “But I need you to go hide somewhere. You know your way around by now, don’t you?”

Another bang rings out and the kid yelps, gaze darting to the noise. 

“I won’t let them hurt you. Now, go on.” Din nudges the kid away. The child lingers, eying him nervously before it finally stumbles off, tripping on its own romper.

Din waits until the kid disappears out of sight before he releases the security latch and draws his blaster. Flares whizz through the thin opening, setting one of his chairs aflame. Another clinks off Din’s pauldron and he fires blind into the narrow opening. 

The lift barely finishes dropping before he’s out the ship, firing. The first three go down easily like a line of vulks, too surprised by his presence to dodge the blasts. Footsteps race close to Din’s left. He hurls a throwing knife at his side, shooting a Rodian in the same breath. The air electrifies as Din spins away, blaster flares pinging off his armor. His heart is in his ears, harried and quick, syncing his movements with its rhythm.

A flare throws his blaster out his hand. _Th-thump._ Din flips his rifle over his shoulder, meeting a shearing pike. _Th-thump._ A reptilian-like creature drives the pike into his balancing stock. 

“The bug. Where is—”

Din slits its throat. Ice-cold blood sprays, dripping off his helm. _Th-thum—_ A roar reaches his ears as he’s rammed to the ground. His rifle clatters against the rock and fear strikes him as a Palliduvan straddles him, raising a hatchet over their head.

Din draws his vibroblade in one fluid motion and drives it into the Duvan’s stomach. Warm guts spill into his lap and he swallows down the urge to gag. They keel over with a whine.

Din’s on his feet before their hatchet hits the ground, searching for the next assailant. All he finds is a host of dead bodies littering the floor. His fists fall at his sides, but his heart is always the last one to leave the fight. It continues racing in his chest, distrusting the stillness. 

Hot smoke from one of the nearby lava fields spirals in the air, cloaking the area in a brief fog. Din grimaces as he picks up his rifle, feeling the gut residue plaster his pants to his skin. _Dank farrick._ That’s going to be a crink to—

Something whistles through the air. Din pivots, raising his vambrace just as a hairline dagger strikes his armor. He spins, eyes darting around for the source, but only the whistle of the wind greets him. _Nothing._ Smoke swirls, creating a cloud so thick Din almost misses the glint of another knife hurling towards him.

He side-steps and it sings past his helm. 

“A Mandalorian.” He hears laughter through the smoke. It’s not so much loud as it is resonant, ghost-like. “Well, isn’t this a treat?”

A steady clink echoes through the fog, bringing with it a shadowed figure. Din’s eyes catch on the ridged, charcoal armor molded to their muscles like bernillian silk, and the gold staff perched in their hand.

Din’s grip tightens on his rifle. “Who are you?”

They cast off their scarlet cloak, unveiling a host of spikes hanging over their brow. _A female Nikto._ “I am a member of the Morgukai.” 

“I do not know of your kind.”

“Neither should you. You are not what I hunt.” 

The Nikto veers left and Din follows; he trails right and she shadows. They’re circling each other in an infinite spiral. 

“What is it you want?” he asks.

She nods at the dead bodies. “What they came for, but failed to retrieve — the fledgling Jedi.” She stops and the staff ignites, crackling with electricity. “The boy.”

Din’s eyes widen. _The… Jedi?_ His gaze flashes to the ship. _The kid._ Just how many hunters are after it?

“I’ve been tracking it for weeks now, following that gang of nitwits. They nabbed the creature off Arvala-7 from some creature who nabbed it off another. It’s passed through enough captors to fill a moonbase,” she says casually, still circling, but Din stutters to halt, reeling. She seizes the moment, hurling a stardart at him. Din deflects, but he’s far too slow. The dart cuts into his collar, drawing a hiss out of him.

“Now, isn’t that a pretty sound…” The Nikto laughs, leaning on her staff with a cavalier air that only kindles Din’s irritation. She cocks her head to the side, regarding him with a pitying hum. “You’ve formed an attachment... It’s already slowing you down. _What a shame._ ”

Din stifles a scowl, knowing she’s only trying to rile him up. Anger can be easy fuel, but its fire is reckless; it’ll cause him to burn out too quickly if he isn’t careful.

“You can’t have the kid,” he says, re-centering.

The Nikto throws her head back and laughs. “You think I want to take it? I’m not here to _take_ the fledgling.” Her eyes darken. “ _I’m here to kill it._ ”

She launches herself at him so quickly Din barely blocks her strike with his rifle. An electric pulse from her staff throws him back, sending him stumbling on the rocks. _Stars above._ He rights himself again. _What is that?_

“You have no idea what you’re in possession of.” The Nikto drags her staff against the ground, leaving scorch marks where it lands. “What that _thing_ can do.”

The words are barely out her mouth before she’s attacking again and suddenly, they’re _darting, feinting, slashing_. The staff swipes over his head and Din ducks, blood rushing to his ears. His flamethrower bursts to life. The fire sends her darting back before she’s at him again. She’s fast — utilizing speed and precision over brute strength— but Din’s faster. 

He kicks the Nikto’s feet out from under her. The staff falls from her hands, but she only uses the momentum to drag him to the ground with her. In a breath, she has a blade to his throat and Din has a knife at her back.

“Oh, you’re good…” She grins, revealing a row of sharp fangs. “But not good enough. It’ll take more energy for you to crack through my spine than it’ll take for me to slit your throat.”

Din flexes his fingers around the knife’s hilt, grimacing. _She’s right._ He’s holding a throwing knife (which is impossible to cut through armor), while his vibroblade still sits in the Duvan’s stomach. _That oversight might just cost him his life._

“While you were so busy cutting down that band of nitwits, I took a stroll in your ship.” She bears down on his chest when he lurches up. “Unfortunately, I turned up empty. So, you’re going to help me.”

Her knife cuts into his skin and Din feels warm blood dribble down his throat.

“Where’s the boy?”

He says nothing.

She leans in, breath ghosting over his viewfinder. “I’ve heard of your people. They say you’re skilled, indomitable, _ruthless_ … I didn’t know stupid was another _great_ quality you possess. A Mandalorian dying for a fledgling?” The blade digs into his skin. “Well, I’ve truly seen it all—”

Her voice chokes off with a high-pitched whine, eyes bulging. The knife clatters to the ground beside him and Din’s eyes dart from the frozen Nikto, to the fallen assailants, to the ship.

To the small figure standing at the ramp’s edge.

_No._

The kid flicks its — _his—_ hand and the Nikto goes sailing off of him. Din jolts up just as the kid falls back on the lift, chest heaving. _Stars above._

“You!” 

Din’s eyes tear away from the kid as the Nikto suddenly stumbles to her feet, eyes locked on the child. She gathers up her staff.

“No!” Din snatches his rifle and fires. Her body disintegrates into a cloud of smoke, scraps of clothing falling to the ground like leaves.

He catapults off the ground, kicking up rocks behind him as he runs to the lift. He falls on his knees clumsily before the kid.

“What are you doing out here?” he says, panting. Sweat dribbles down his temple. “I told you to stay on the ship. I told you to go. I told you—”

The kid whimpers weakly and Din’s nails dig into his own knee, silencing him from finishing his foolish chide. _This isn’t the time._

“Where…” He swallows, feeling a strain in his voice. His eyes dart around the kid’s form, searching for a wound, a scratch, _anything_ that might explain why the kid’s on the verge of passing out? “Where are you hurt?”

The child just whimpers and Din lays down his rifle, gathering him up. He stands, teetering on his feet. The kid shouldn’t be shaking this bad — not in the sweltering heat. He doesn’t feel cold nor does he seem to be wounded. _But he is hurt._ Din has half the mind to worry and half the mind to shoot _something_ again when the child nestles against his breastplate, beginning to doze off.

Din shakes the kid’s chest. “Hey, no. You shouldn’t—”

A small hand curls around his finger and Din quiets, feeling a lump lodge itself in his throat. He eyes the landscape instead, taking in the discarded blasters, the splatters of blood, and the remnant scraps of the Nikto’s singed clothing. It’s a wonder he’s still standing. It’s a wonder he’s still alive _._

He should be relieved. The fight is over. But anxiety is sitting on Din’s chest, making it hard to breathe. 

_That gang of hunters… They stole the kid._ There’s so much the Nikto didn’t divulge, but that small piece of information is enough to kindle his anger and grief. Din may keep to himself, but he doesn’t keep his head in the sand. He knows about the hunters who steal children for profit. The underground business is as murky as they come, putting even the seediest lowlifes within the Guild to shame. 

_But this…_ Din didn’t expect this. 

He gazes back down at the child sleeping in his arms, feeling a host of questions rise to the surface, but the questions are a distraction. It’s easier to interrogate and probe than it is to sit with what he knows. _To sit with the truth._

That the kid isn’t some wandering child, looking for adventure. It’s… _a foundling_. 

A foundling who’s now in his care.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! And the first installment is done. If you've made it this far, you're a saint. Major kudos to you. As you feel so inclined, share any of your reactions, thoughts, feelings, or observations below. 
> 
> **A Brief Word About the Playlists:** I chose songs that not only match the character (or relationship) lyrically but also tonally. For instance, if you listen to 'Din's Soundtrack', the songs embody thematic elements of longing, searching, soft hope, internal tension, grief, and determination. In essence, I selected songs that match Din's internal landscape: he's a man who's given up searching --for answers to his questions, for a logical reason to his misfortune, for a place to belong, for a foundling that doesn't exist for him (e.g. taking his name off the cycle roster) -- but who's always on the faultlines of longing. So, his playlist is meant to capture that tension. 'Grogu's Soundtrack' (which intentionally and primarily features instrumentals) embodies elements of playfulness, wonder, sadness, and gaiety. The 'Father and His Son' soundtrack melds the tones of both of their individual soundtracks into a "new sound": instrumentals and lyrics, grief and joy, wonder and hesitation.
> 
>  **A Brief Word About Narrative Structure & Character Development:** I tend to think of Din like an onion. He has so many layers, all of which are never revealed at once and, most often, tend to be unveiled gradually. Also, he tends to be a one-line speaker who rarely gives much away vocally. So, in an attempt to match this personality trait, I decided to reveal his situation layer-by-layer, rather than info-dumping. For instance, in the first scene, Din receives the comm message and we discover he's carrying some kind of grief, but it remains unnamed. In the next scene, we find out all Mandalorians receive a recurring dream of their foundling (or foundlings _plural_ ), but Din's the exception. However, we don't know why he is yet. In the next scene, we find out he has a recurring nightmare but no foundling. Thus, the first half of this installment carries like a sequence (the peeling away at the onion). Din's awaking from his dream is the micro-climax. There, one finally holds all the cards that describe his situation: Din does not have a dream of a foundling, just a recurring, horrific nightmare that tells him nothing. He is an exception to the Mandalorian rule because he doesn't have a foundling; he received a dream, yes, but not of a child. This makes him an anomaly and a source of suspicion among the Tribe.
> 
>  **A Brief Word About Plot Details:** Morgukais are typically male, but I wanted to shake things up and make the Nikto female. As mentioned before, this story diverts from canon, while retaining key plot-points (e.g. the Covert, Din being a bounty-hunter, the child stumbling into his care, etc.), but ultimately, we're in an alternate universe of my own making. Lastly, this story toggles between Third-Person Subjective POV/Deep POV. Meaning: this entire story is viewed through Din's perspective because, in my imagination, Din has a rich inner world.
> 
> Until next time, pals! - Jaz.


	2. Part II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **A/N:** Thank you all. I've been so moved by y'all's love for this story thus far (and with only one chapter). For those of you who comment, press kudo, bookmark, or do none of that (you: my invisible readers), I appreciate you all. 
> 
> As you may have noticed, the chapter count has increased from three to six (you can blame [@AsunaChinaDoll](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsunaChinaDoll) for that. I had nothing to do with it).
> 
> I hope you enjoy the latest installment.

* * *

** Part Two **

* * *

When Din was a boy, his _buir_ used to say the currents of fate wait for no one.

The mighty kneel at its call.

The weak tremble at its beckoning.

But both are caught in its tide, swept away toward their destiny.

The old man cast the hand of fate as some benevolent, omniscient force always leading a person toward a favorable end. One may run from it, try to escape it, but fate will summon them just the same.

Even as a kid, Din felt the unpredictability of such a force. How does fate dole out its favors? Does it rain down a harvest of blessing on some, while inflicting suffering on others? Is it truly good? And if fate _is_ good, why doesn’t it make their Findings easier? Why must their people lose weeks, years, _decades_ searching aimlessly through the galaxy? _A dream isn’t much to go by_ , Din had scoffed.

His _buir_ just drew him close then, disagreeing (“I found you, didn’t I?”).

It was enough for Din to believe then.

_But now?_

Din’s hand tightens around the sixth tracking fob he’d picked off the hunters, feeling his stomach twist as the beacon blinks red. Clearly, _fate_ didn’t care about sweeping a child up in its tide of abduction and misery. Neither did it care about disrupting a kid’s livelihood. It almost killed the kid at the hand of that Nikto.

But apparently, _such_ is the benevolent hand of fate.

Din crushes the fob under his boot, hurling the pieces into the fire. The flames flare up, crackling excitedly with the new kindling as if hungry for more. There are no more tracking fobs though; he destroyed all of them alongside the bodies.

_But more hunters will come…_

Din pushes the thought away as soon as it arrives. Yet, his eyes can’t help but find their way back to the ship, recalling the blaster flares, the chaos, and the child currently sleeping inside.

 _Not just any child,_ his memory corrects. _A foundling._

The kid’s been asleep for what feels like an eternity, tucked in a make-shift hammock made up of tarp and canopy belting — a poor attempt for a bed— and Din can’t help but think it’s some deranged metaphor for this mess he’s found himself in. He’s been going over what he knows —the bare facts— for hours, but the attempt is as dismal as the kid’s bedding. _He has so_ _little to work with_. The kid was kidnapped, to be sure, and his captors _did_ pursue him to the Crest.

But beyond that? Din knows next to nothing.

The lift whines behind him and Din turns around, finding the child toddling down the landing with an insulator cloth (Din’s poor excuse for a blanket) in one hand while scrubbing his eyes with the other.

Din’s shoulders relax. “You’re awake.”

The kid holds his arms up and Din gives in. He cradles him in his arm, smoothing the cloth on top of him.

“Are you feeling any better?”

The kid yawns, smacking his lips and Din actually smiles for the first time in weeks. Back when the kid first arrived, he caught himself smiling all the time; but then, the child disappeared and worry-lines replaced where his smile used to be. He can’t say he’s bothered by its return now.

Kindling crackles, snapping Din’s attention back to the fire just in time to see the Nikto’s staff disintegrate, belching out black smoke and sparks. He should feel satisfied, but the staff only elicits the same old warning.

_More will come…_

“The Nikto,” he says, swallowing the implications of that warning away. “She said you were…”

The child blinks up at him innocently and Din loses his voice. He can’t bear to say the words, but it doesn’t seem to matter; the memories still come to him unbidden and indicting. His disheveled blanket. The gobbled-up foodstuffs. The kid’s tendency to eat until he made himself sick. The way the kid trembled at the sight of his gun.

_Like he’d been on the receiving end of one before…_

Din’s hand closes into a fist. “We’ll find your family. Until then, I’ll—”

 _He’ll what?_ There are no stipulations, no addendums in the Creed for situations like this. Foundlings are discovered by their intended parent and Din isn’t…

He clenches his jaw against the thought. What else is he supposed to do then? The child isn’t safe here. He has powers, sure, but he can’t seem to do much else after he uses them.

He’s still, above all things, a child.

“Until then,” Din says, “I’ll protect you.”

The kid burrows into his chest, seeking out warmth as a gust of wind blows through them. Din’s armor is a poor substitute for heat though —meant for protecting, not _nurturing_ — and if the kid’s frustrated jostlings are anything to go by, he knows it too. 

Din rearranges the insulator cloth so it’s stuffed between his chest and the kid’s body, creating a plush barrier. Immediately, the child quiets, eyes drooping, flirting with the idea of sleep again.

“It’s getting late…” Din eyes the skyline burning orange with the setting sun. “I’m sure you’re hungry by now. We can get some food? Or play with that knob you like? What do you say, kid—?”

Soft snores whistle against his breastplate and Din’s shoulders fall, amused but unsurprised.

“Why did you come out here if you were still tired?”

The child just cuddles closer, cheek slipping from the cloth and onto his armor again and Din can already imagine the impressions that’ll be on the kid’s face when he wakes — textured ridges and wrinkles, map lines telling of where he’s been. He looks swollen with sleep and something within Din unravels at the sight, simultaneously moved and astonished.

His hand hovers over the child’s face and before he can quell it, an old ache resurrects itself. He’s made a habit of taking his longing and burying it alive — not killing it, but not feeling it either. But the longing is returning now, seeping into his chest, melding with his grief and Din knows —from experience, from history, from _memory—_ how this will end for him.

His hand falls at his side.

The ache subsides.

And the longing goes back under, buried.

But the questions looming in the back of his mind do not go away. There’s one, in particular, that’s been haunting him ever since he discovered the kid was a foundling; one that makes his wrist burn the more he considers it.

How could _he_ have found a child?

It is unlikely anyone in the Tribe would know what to do and even if someone did, he wouldn’t bring such a situation before them. The news would only incite shock and censure and he’d prefer to avoid both reactions.

Din shifts the kid to his other arm, more out of a need to move his body than out of a need to relieve aching limbs. The blanket catches on his vambrace. He unfastens it, moving to tuck the corners back in when his eyes land on the tattoo peeking out from behind his sleeve. He freezes, feeling an idea emerge.

There might not be anyone who can give him answers.

_But there is someone he can bring his questions to._

✵

The Armorer handles her emotion like the metal she forges — with care and practiced skill. She takes her emotion and submerges it in indifference, reshaping it into something more durable. Feeling is a vulnerable, unbridled thing and she is all hard lines and erect posture, control and discretion. The more she feels, the less she shows.

It’s a revelation that’s taken Din years to understand. So when he finishes relaying the story and she hasn’t moved a muscle, hasn’t shifted in her seat, hasn’t so much as tilted her helm, he _knows._

“You discovered a foundling?” she asks cooly, sitting as rigid as a stone. He’s seen such detachment before. _Shock,_ Din reads. _And something else…_

“Yes.” Din hesitates. “No, he found me.”

“The _foundling_ found _you_?”

She’s mirroring, not to make sure she understands but to temper a reaction. It’s a grounding technique. One she taught him years ago.

The shoulder bag jostles against Din’s hip and he smooths a hand down its side, coaxing the child to still. He can feel the Armorer’s eyes watching him and he doesn’t have to wonder what she sees. _What both troubles and shocks her._ Instinctively, Din brushes his thumb against his sleeve, making sure his wrist is still covered.

“Show it to me.”

Obediently, he sets the bag on the table and lowers the sides with care. The kid pops up with a chirp, hurrying out before Din can even remove his hands. He trips over a lip in the bag and flails, face planting with an ‘oomph’.

“ _This_ is the foundling?”

The kid’s ears fly up, and he whips around to her so fast it’s a wonder he didn’t strain his neck in the process. The Armorer doesn’t so much as pay him a nod. The kid barrels into Din’s chest, scrabbling at his arms like he’s torn between wanting to be held or wanting to hold on to _him._

“Yes, this…This is—” Heat stokes on Din’s face as the child releases a whine, looking about ready to threaten tears if he’s not picked up soon. Hurriedly, Din settles him on his lap. “This is he.”

“It’s formed an attachment to you,” she observes.

Din presses his lips together, not wanting to say it, but he has to make sure she’d never think he would… “You must know, I didn’t… I wouldn’t force such a bond.”

“No.” Her helm dips to the kid. “I do not believe you did.”

The child digs his face in Din's stomach, starting to fuss. Din pulls out the gear-shift knob to quiet him.

“The hunters you spoke of…” The Armorer’s voice sharpens, sounding almost lethal. “Do they still live?”

Din tilts his head to the side, insulted.

“I see…” She focuses on the child again, leaning in. “It looks helpless.”

“He’s not. He can… move things with his mind.”

“I know of such things.” The Armorer rises, returning with an unshaped dura-plate between a pair of tongs. The kiln’s flames sizzle around the plate, igniting pink and sending shadows dancing across her helm. Yet, she is like the still waters of Gorgal. Placid and unmoved. “The songs of eons past tell of battles waged between Mandalore the Great and an order of sorcerers known as Jedi.”

Din starts. “He’s an enemy?”

“Its kind were enemies, but this child is not.” She sets the plate aside. “This one is a foundling.”

Tension sits in Din’s gut, weighing him down for a different reason. “I destroyed the tracking fobs, but more hunters will come. They’ll be drawn back here to the Covert. If we were discovered…” Din twists his lips together. “We are still vulnerable and the child is alone.”

“Is that your only concern?” she asks tonelessly. “For the Tribe and the child’s safety?”

He says nothing, letting his silence speak what he cannot say with words.

“I presume you know the ancient rites of the Creed.”

Din's brows knit together, confused. “I do."

“Then, you know what it says about foundlings.” The Armorer straightens, laying the tongs down on the kiln’s rim. “Until the child is reunited with its kind,” she says, “you are as its father.”

Din’s eyes widen. He opens his mouth to protest, but a bitter taste slinks across his tongue, souring every objection; he presses his lips together into a thin line. She’s citing an old law, one they did away with once the dreams arrived. Initially, by Creed, they couldn’t leave foundlings but with the dreams’ inception, such a law became antiquated, _unnecessary_ (after all, why would they abandon their own dream child?).

His signet-mark feels hot enough to rival the kiln’s flames, smarting with every passing second. He understands why she’s applying the law — foundlings are the future— but she’s asking him to be the one thing _he can’t be._

“Something troubles you,” she notices.

Din fights the urge to look away. A host of responses —all truthful and revealing— wait on his tongue. _Have you forgotten what you said all those years ago? We were younger then and time has changed nothing. You are still ruthlessly certain and I am hopelessly lost._

“You know I’m not… That I don’t have—” Din’s hands tighten around his knees and the child glances up, eying him with concern. A small hand finds his arm. “I am not his intended.”

“No, you are not,” she agrees, reaching for a damaged pauldron with the tongs. “Nevertheless, you cannot leave it alone. It would die.”

“I wouldn’t abandon him. But what you are asking me to do… It isn’t _done_.”

The kiln sputters as the Armorer submerges the pauldron in its heat. “Our annals tell of a time when we used to take in foundlings _before_ the dreams arrived.”

Din frowns. “That was in the past.”

“And yet, history rises to address you in the present,” she says. “Do you not find yourself in the same situation?”

“It is hardly similar.”

“I cannot imagine why.”

“You know why,” he snaps, forgetting himself.

The child whimpers in his lap, abandoning the ball to curl in on himself. Din shushes him, smoothing a hand down his back apologetically before handing him the knob.

Only when the whimpers quiet does Din dip his head to her. “Forgive me.”

The Armorer regards him silently. “You fear censure.”

“The ancient way…” Din shakes his head. “It isn’t who we are now. I can protect the kid, but I can’t be his father.”

“You must. The child requires nurturing,” she says, retrieving a dross ladle. “You will provide such care until you locate its kind.”

Her tone says that’s the end of this tirade, but Din can’t let it go. He doesn’t need her to make concessions on his behalf. He doesn’t _want_ her to.

The child squirms in his lap, drawing Din’s attention to him. The kid pushes at his arms until he manages to squeeze out from under them, sliding to the floor instead. Din can't help but follow him with his eyes, watching as the ball falls out of the kid's hands, dribbling onto the floor. An accidental kick sends it spiraling toward the main hall. Squealing, the child wobbles after it.

Din jerks up. “Don’t—”

“There is no need to worry,” the Armorer says without looking at him. She continues pouring dross into the ladle. “The child will refrain from venturing anywhere you are not.”

Din doesn’t know about that. What he _does know_ is that the hall leads to the mess, where most of the Tribe go to eat at this time of day. If they found out about the kid, _about this Finding_ , there would be an inquiry — and not a pleasant one either.

He wavers on his feet as the kid captures the ball and pauses at the hall’s entrance, standing in the thick of a shadow. Someone laughs beyond the corridor and Din swallows, torn between issuing another warning or going to collect the child himself.

“Kid—”

The child scuttles back, almost tripping over his own feet as he runs to hide behind Din’s leg. Wide-eyed, the kid stares up at him, stabbing a finger at the shadowed entrance.

“I know it’s scary.”

The kid inches behind his leg a little more, shooting an adorably mean glare at the hall before holding up the ball to him.

“I saw,” Din says, understanding. “You did good, kid.”

The Armorer’s attention is on him when Din looks up at her and he shifts his footing, feeling a strange sort of self-consciousness.

“Do you know why you were chosen as _beroya_?”

He picks up the kid. “I was told it was due to Gavit’s injuries.”

“Bounty-hunting attracts many for different reasons,” the Armorer speaks into the kiln. “Some venture down its path in search of vainglory. Others are driven by the rewards. But for those who walk the Way of the Mandalore, the _beroya_ is both a provider and a sustainer of life. They are the backbone of the community.”

He scowls. “As I’ve heard.”

“I can only assume you speak of Mauns Gavit again.” She goes to sit down and Din follows her. “Yes, he would know a great deal about strength. But the other side, I doubt he knows much.”

“Other side?”

The child climbs onto the table and the Armorer’s helm follows him, watching as he rolls the ball back and forth.

“It is true the _beroya_ is the backbone of the community,” she says, still observing the kid. “But they are also its heart. Bounty-hunting is a precarious business. Too much strength and one can become arrogant. Too much heart and one can get themselves killed. But an equal measure in both is… _rare_ , but extraordinary nonetheless.”

He can feel her eyes on him.

“Do you understand what I am saying?”

Din swallows, trying to locate his voice. “I…do.”

“Good.” She takes out a familiar pouch. “I trust you will use this wisely.”

The contents clink when they’re set on the table, seizing the child’s attention. He abandons the ball in favor of poking at the bag, giggling when it jingles in response.

“Those rewards,” Din says, frowning. “They’re for the—”

“ _Foundlings_ ,” she affirms, nodding at the kid. “As I recall, one is in your charge now.”

Din eyes the pouch, knowing how much is in there.

“I do not need so much.”

“Because you ask for so little,” the Armorer replies, slipping the pouch from the kid. The little womp rat tucks his face behind his collar, whining at the loss. “Besides, the foundling requires more than your lifestyle permits. Will you deny it that opportunity for a better livelihood?”

It’s a gentle reproof, but a reproof nonetheless.

“I will make the child a carrier,” she says. “It will take me two days. Can you return by then?”

“A carrier?”

“If hunters are in pursuit of the foundling as you say, then your satchel will hardly protect it well. I will enable the carrier to sync to your vambrace, so you may direct its motion control.”

Din’s throat tightens, full of emotion. “I—”

The Armorer cuts him off with a definitive nod. She’s never been one to accept gratitude, principally because she deems it unnecessary (he learned that lesson the hard way in the past and is loath to repeat it again), but Din still feels the words on his tongue. She’s always been a walking contradiction: fiercely just, yet merciful. Formidable, yet kind. He doesn’t know how to thank her for that _._

“Although, I must advise you: the foundling is only in your care temporarily. You must locate its kind and return it,” she says. “You know what will happen if you fail.”

And he does. She’s already thinning the law to accommodate him, but it can only extend so far. It isn’t their Way to keep children that don’t belong to them. Din would never ask for such a thing. No child should be separated from their people. The kid deserves better than that.

_He has to go back._

The Armorer rises. “Foundlings are the future.”

“They are…” His eyes rest on the kid.

“This is the Way.”

Din stands, feeling conviction solidify in his chest. “This is the Way.”

✵

Necessities are expensive on Nevarro.

It’s the one thing he tends to forget about the planet. Back when Nevarro was a bounty-hunter’s hive, one could easily buy a packet of emergency air filters or waste recyclers for dirt cheap (after all people didn’t come to the planet for a few survival necessities). But the planet’s renovation changed all that. The base price for most essentials starts at five druggats.

The renovation is new, but Din’s history with Nevarro is old. It’s why when he’s at a miscellaneous booth, debating whether to stock up on extra food (which, based on the kid’s appetite, they might undoubtedly need) or purchase a blanket for the kid that costs twelve druggats but looks like it should cost nine, he remembers why he doesn’t buy most of his necessities here.

Din runs the blanket through his fingers, conscious of the seller who hasn’t stopped eying him since he arrived, and gives in. Grumbling, he hands over the druggats and takes the blanket.

He’s considering how to make up the difference (maybe forgoing buying a water recycler) when the kid leans out of the shoulder bag, pointing at an open toy stand.

“We’re not here for toys,” he says.

The kid stabs his finger at the stand like Din clearly didn’t hear him.

“No.”

The child blinks up at him pleadingly. Din glances at the shop, taking in its toys, dolls, and strange knick-knacks, and feels a shudder roll through his body.

“Fine, but we’re only going to look.”

The stand itself isn’t big by any means and yet, as they walk up to it, Din feels severely overwhelmed. It looks like the kaleidoscopic festive houses on Ryloth with its bright colors and obnoxious decorations. He sets the kid on the ground, following close behind as the kid waddles over to a toy shelf.

Din bats aside an oversized plush animal only to run into another. An auto-instrument blasts upbeat music through the stand and it's far too soon to check the time and yet, Din still feels the urge to do so. This place is as much of a torment as it is a nightmare.

There’s a tug on his pant leg and he looks down, finding the kid holding up a stuffie.

“No.” Din looks at the price tag and if it wasn’t a ‘no’ before it definitely is now. “That isn’t a necessity.”

The kid’s eyes round into saucers.

“We’re here for provisions and supplies, not toys.” He takes the stuffie and the child keens, straining to snatch it back. “I’ll get you something else.”

Deflating, the kid walks off.

“Hey, we’re not done talking.” Din sets his hands on his hips.

The kid blows air at him.

Din barely bites back a response. How did he end up with such a stubborn child? The foundlings in the Tribe can be petulant at times, but few forget their manners completely. He’s pretty sure the kid doesn’t have a polite bone in his body. Strong-willed? Definitely. But respectful? No. _At least not in this case._

The child rocks on his feet in front of the toy shelf, fiddling with another stuffie and Din sighs. They really don’t have the money for it, not when he’s hoping to stock up on supplies. There’s no telling how far this quest will take him and if hunters are still after the kid, it’s better to make as few pit stops as they can.

_And yet._

The kid keeps glancing at the stuffie in Din's hand and Din knows he’s losing ground. Just like he knows the kid is only whining to get him to change his mind.

He just hates the fact that it’s working.

“Alright,” Din concedes.

The child's ears fly up. The innocent look would have worked if he hadn’t been tugging on the strings of Din’s moneybag for the last few minutes. _Stars above, he’s worse than Peli._

“One and you’re done, you hear me? We don’t have enough money for—”

The kid squeals and grabs five.

Din spends the next few minutes trying to negotiate him down to three.

•••

It's high-noon by the time Din slinks out of the toy stand, carrying less of what he'd intended to spend money on and more of what they clearly don’t need. The crowd jostles him down the street, only adding to his annoyance. The Armorer said to use the money wisely and in the span of a few hours, he’s given in to round eyes and soft whimpers, buying toys, stuffed animals, and baubles. _Stars above._ Is he really so easily persuaded?

"Twenty pieces!" A vendor calls out over the throng of voices, brandishing a reddish fruit. "Twenty pieces for fresh _po'dorj_! A competitive price!" He strains from his booth as Din walks by. "You, sir—"

Din looks at him and the vendor pales, dropping the fruit.

The child peeks out from the shoulder bag and waves two new stuffies at him.

"Put those back," Din says. "You'll lose them that way."

The kid ignores him and waves the toys at another seller. Din rolls his eyes, refusing to care.

Sighing, he shoves through the crowd until he finds a familiar side street. _The one that leads to Peli's booth._ He doesn't need anything from her; neither does he need any of the goods in that part of the market. Still, he finds himself slipping down the side-street, feeling the shoulder bag grow heavier and heavier with each step.

There’s a customer at her booth. Din hangs back against the wall, waiting until they're done paying before he finally saunters up.

Peli pauses from scooping the coins into her money pouch and takes one look at Din, the kid, and the bags of toys dangling from his rifle, and rolls her eyes. "Well, that figures."

Din sinks down at the booth table as she walks off, dropping the provisions with him. He expected surprise from her, possibly even shock, but not nonchalance. He sets the shoulder bag on the table and the kid stumbles out with his stuffies.

“Well…” Peli says when she returns, picking up the child. “Let Peli take a good look at you.”

The kid hugs the toys to his chest as if to protect _them_ from _her_. Din would have called it noble if the kid didn’t go and hide his face behind his collar afterward.

“So,” she starts, “this new chickie of yours…”

“He’s not mine,” Din interjects.

“This new _baby_.” She rolls her eyes. “He gotta name?”

Din raises a brow. _Is that all she wants to know?_ “The hunters who had him didn’t mention anything,” he reveals intentionally.

Peli doesn’t even bite. “He looks like a Rhoro to me.”

Din’s lips part in surprise. “I found the kid,” he reiterates.

“Well, I figured that, tin can. What else woulda happened? It just fell out of the sky? Geez,” she says, bouncing the kid in her arms. “Sometimes you aren't the smartest cog in the spinwheel.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Y’know, if this thing ever divides or buds, I’d gladly pay for the offspring,” she says, eying the child with interest. “How much you want for him?  Just kidding, but not really.” Peli shakes her head playfully at the kid and he giggles. “He’s a slight little thing. You been feeding him?”

“He’s eaten half of my food," Din says numbly, reeling. "But I… What I was saying before—”

“So, that’s a no?” she cuts in. “Can’t tell with that helmet thing, so I’m gonna take it as a ‘no’.”

Din lets out a slow, barely-restrained breath. “What I’m trying to say is—”

“I know.”

“You…do?”

Peli slings the kid around her hip. “Listen Mando, you said he was in danger. I’m assuming you took care of it and now you’ve got another mouth to feed. That’s a good enough explanation for me as any.”

Din’s mouth opens, then closes, unsure of what to say. Everyone always has questions of him. But Peli is acting like it’s the most normal thing in the world for him to help a lost child. Like there’s nothing wrong with that.

_Like there’s nothing wrong with him._

The child lets out a whine, straining for him in Peli’s arms and she’s quick to release him onto the table.  The kid waddles over and pats Din's arm, holding up a stuffie.

Din nods. "I'm glad you like it."

The kid frowns and repeats the action. It’s a familiar gesture — one Din saw during his first encounter with the kid and he still doesn’t know what to do with it. Before, the gesture involved the foodstuffs. But now, the kid's pointing at the stuffie and smiling up at him like he’s happy and appreciative about—

_Oh_.

“You’re…you’re welcome,” he says.

The kid drops a toy to grab his finger and Din feels his face heat. In the same moment, he also feels a pair of eyes watching them.

“Stop staring,” he grumbles without looking up.

“Why the hell would I be staring at your dingy shell?” Peli snaps back, but he doesn’t feel her gaze leave him. She isn’t even trying to hide it now.

It is so unlike her. Peli doesn’t really care about the business of others. She’s prodded at Din’s culture, more out of sheer curiosity (and a penchant to be annoying) than anything else, but she tends to have a “don’t tell, won’t ask” policy.

So, this response is unusual. She knows that he knows why she’s staring, and he feels the need to tell her not to get too attached.

This isn’t a sure thing with the kid.

It’s only temporary.

Din needs to tell her that.

The kid’s grip tightens around his finger and Din falters, losing ground for the second time that day.

He should tell her.

_He doesn’t._

✵

He turns up again two days later with a favor he’s fairly sure Peli will reject.

“Can you watch him for me?” Din says setting the shoulder bag on the booth table. The child scuttles out, knocking over a tin of antiseptic packets in his rush. He toddles down the table holding a toy in one hand and the gear-shift knob in the other.

“I fix ships, tin can.” She huffs, shoving the packets back in the tin. “I don’t watch—”

Din throws some money on the table.

Peli purses her lips. “I mean… Is that all the chickie is worth to you?” She waves her hand at the money. “A few druggats?”

Scowling, he throws in an ingot.

“Y’know,” she says, cracking the metal coin between her teeth. “Parenthood is lookin’ real good on you.”

He frowns. “You mean I’m losing money.”

“Oh, don’t be such a doop bug!” She waves her hand at him, then winks. “I think you make it look fashionable.”

Din’s frown only deepens further.

“Well, where are you being whisked off to?” Peli says, gathering the kid into her arms.

“I just need to retrieve something.”

He wishes retrieving the carrier was the hardest part of the process. The kid tends to be clingy — wanting to be held, carried from room to room or, at the very least, keep a hand on _some part_ of Din. It makes getting the kid into the shoulder bag a hassle every time. He doesn’t even want to imagine what getting him in the carrier is going to be like. Undoubtedly, he’ll need an incentive.

Din’s eyes drift to the knob in the kid’s hand, knowing he’s about to raise all kinds of hell. Gingerly, he slips it from the kid’s hand.

The child lurches in Peli’s arms, scrambling after the ball.

“I’m going to give it back,” Din tries to say, but the child is already scrubbing at his eyes.

Peli holds the kid out like he’s a bomb waiting to go off. “Hey, hey, hey, ya little womp rat. Don’t cry,” she soothes before flashing Din a heated glare. “You better fix this.”

“I’m _trying_ ,” he grits out.

“Well try harder.”

Din leans down in front of the child with a sigh. “How about this: give me until sunset and if I’m not back with the ball, you have full permission to be mad at me.”

“Or…” Peli says to the kid. “You can give him hell now.”

Din doesn’t even have the patience to glare at her.

The child peeks out from behind his fists, revealing wet-rimmed eyes and Din softens, reaching out to stroke his face. The kid nuzzles his palm and the gesture would have been endearing if his face wasn’t so dejected. Din traces his thumb over the kid’s cheek.

“I’ll be back by sunset,” he reminds softly, straightening. “I promise.”

✵

The mess commons is a whirlwind of activity when Din enters the area. Utensils clink against plates and raucous laughter swell around him, sending echoes down the tunnel. The legion of bodies usually leave him feeling unsettled on a good day and wholly overwhelmed on a bad day. But _today_ is another experience entirely.

More activity means less eyes. Less eyes means a seamless departure.

As he passes by the slop line, he's hit with the familiar scent of curried _t_ _iingilar_ and honeyed _shig_ — a rich blend of sweet and spicy. He pauses, wavering on his feet; he remembers sitting cross-legged on the floor, eating such delicacies with his _buir._ The old man thought it was the food Din favored, but honestly, it was just the company. The settlement was fast-paced; few could waste time enjoying another's company as they ate. There were places to be and work to be done. But the old man treated shared meals as the most important time of the day. _Precious time to spend together._

A woman bumps into him with a grumble, snapping him out of the memory. Din hurries along, squeezing by two teens practicing an _akaani_ strike against each other —with dismal success— and bypasses the waste chutes. 

After trying and failing to weave around the tables, Din slides along the wall instead. The archway leading to the Armorer’s cove is only mere feet away. His hand tightens around the kid’s ball as satisfaction surges in his chest. He’s close enough to—

“Surprised to see you here.”

Din freezes, jaw locking in place if only to restrain the incipient curse that almost leaves his mouth. Gold armor slinks out from the shadows to tower over him.

“Where else would I be?” Din bites out.

Gavit folds his arms over his chest. “You tell me.”

A whistle suddenly shrills through the mess and Din actually swears this time.

“ _Miit!_ ” _Announcements._

Everyone rises from their chairs and it’s only years of training that makes Din straighten alongside Gavit, driven by instinct more than obedience. The announcer rises and Din checks out.

“There’s a proverb I’ve been interested in,” Gavit says lowly, still facing forward as the announcer drones on. “A child is birthed in the dreams of _verda_ , but nightmares haunt the _demagolka_.”

Din says nothing.

“What a play on words… The _verda_ — a warrior race, intent on the protection of little ones. The _demagolka_ — a symbol of nightmarish fear, inflicting harm on children,” he whispers. “Fascinating, isn’t it? Monsters and nightmares. Children and dreams.”

Din’s hand tightens around the ball. “If there’s something you want to say, spit it out.”

“I’m speaking only of a proverb.”

“Are you?”

Gavit chuckles under his breath. “You’re tense over a pithy saying.”

“It depends on who’s saying it.”

The announcer’s datapad falls at their side, nearing the end of their report, and Din’s eyes flicker to the archway again.

“Why did you go see the Armorer before?” Gavit asks. _And there it is…_ “I saw you. More importantly, I know you completed the reward exchange when you arrived, and your armor shows no sign of damage.”

“You’re concerned about my dealings?”

“I’m _concerned_ about the Tribe,” Gavit corrects.

The announcer steps down and the chatter picks back up, but everyone remains standing, waiting for the official dismissal. Gavit doesn’t wait for it, turning to him with the swiftness of a vanthyr.

“The last person who received dreams like yours was old Sano Jen for murdering our _vod_. The person before that betrayed the Tribe. It begs the question: what did you do?”

Din scowls, feeling irritation bleed through his restraint. He tries to angle around him but Gavit shadows, following when he tries to side-step, intercepting when he tries to circle around.

“Let me pass.”

“You are always so eager to depart. Tell me something, Djarin: why is it you don’t eat with us? Or join our social gatherings? Or frequent our communal spaces?” he grills. “If you’re not careful, one might think you have something to hide. Or have done something wrong.”

Din presses his lips together.

“Tell me why you’re here, seeking the Armorer’s presence?”

 _He doesn’t have time for this…_ Neither is he about to waste time trying to explain himself.

Din moves to brush by him when Gavit seizes him by the arm, shoving him back into a stack of food trays. Tension strikes the room like lightning, dialing the cacophony of chatter down to a cautious hum and drawing alert eyes on them both.

In the silence, something dribbles on the floor, spiraling into Gavit’s boot. Gavit picks it up, turning it slowly in his hand and fear twists in Din’s gut with each roll.

_The ball._

“Give…” Din swallows. “Give it to me.”

“This _means_ something to you?”

Din’s hands tremble at his sides. He balls them into fists, trying to make it stop.

Gavit’s helm dips at the action. “ _I see…_ Well, this affords us an opportunity: you want your trinket. I want answers to my questions. So, what’ll it be?”

He folds his hands behind his back, puffing out his chest, replicating a _block stance_ with practiced ease. They learned that stance together once, training side-by-side in the Corps. It was intended for defectors and informers. _Cowards_ who transgressed the Way. Din rocks on his feet. _Is that what he is now?_

His gaze travels through the crowd — past Vizsla, Ior, Sif, and others who are waiting to see what this will turn into. They cannot interfere — not when Gavit is close to challenging him. Din knows there’s no way around it (not without him losing the ball in the process) and still, he feels the weight of a brewing catastrophe rise in his gut.

“I…discovered a foundling.”

Several bodies stiffen; someone inhales sharply; a cup shatters on the floor, and Din tenses through it all. They are a people not often shocked — _almost never—_ but as usual, he’s found a way to disrupt the norm. Once again, he’s become an anomaly.

“You couldn’t have.” Gavit shakes his head. “That’s impossible.”

“It’s what happened.”

“And such a finding was absent of intent?”

Din tilts his head to the side, reading between the lines. “You accuse me of kidnapping?”

“Accuse, no. I am not so _tame_ as to do that. Charge you with it? Yes.” His stance widens and his hand rests on his gun. _Attack position._ “You have no dream child. Yet, you speak of some foundling you discovered by sheer happenstance without presuming there would be questions? Do you take us to be fools—?”

“Of course not.”

“—Or have you grown so foreign to your own people in your time away, gallivanting through the universe, that you know nothing of our ways anymore?”

Din’s fingernails almost cut through his gloves.

“You must have forgotten, so permit me to remind you.” Gavit looms over him. “Our foundlings are fated; we do not _stumble_ upon one.”

“I know that,” Din snaps.

“Then, you understand your predicament. You _couldn’t_ have found that child unless something questionable happened. So, what was it?”

Blood rushes to Din’s ears, hot and insistent.

Gavit’s helm knocks into his own. “I asked you a question.”

“And I chose not to answer.”

“You will when I’m speaking to you. Or, do you not want your trinket?”

Din grinds his teeth. “I didn’t steal a child.”

“You expect us to believe that—”

“I don’t expect anything from you.”

Gavit jabs a finger into his breastplate. “You took that kid.”

“I didn’t.”

“For what?” Gavit continues on. “So, you could come in here brandishing this child of yours—”

“I never said he was mine.”

“In order to cover your shame—”

“ _What_ shame?”

“—and vie for honor.”

“I don’t _care_ about honor!” Din shoves him with a growl.

Gavit stumbles back, knocking a chair to the ground. A circle forms around them, sensing a challenge on the horizon. The silence is deafening, pregnant with expectation. Like even the room is holding its breath.

“So little has changed…You’re still _weak,_ ” Gavit spits as he straightens. “While we waste away here in the tunnels, you flit about the universe with your tail between your legs.”

Din’s eyes snap up. “I hunt to keep the Tribe alive.”

“You _hunt_ to run away. Do not confuse shame with altruism.”

Din clenches his jaw as the goad teases at his restraint. Gavit is provoking him, intending to start a fight. He steps in front of him, but Din’s eyes are on his shadow, reading the time. _Sunset will be upon them soon._

If he goes now, he can get the carrier and make it back to the kid early. But if he does, he’ll be a coward in the eyes of Gavit and the Tribe.

Din makes the choice between gritted teeth and swallowed pride. “Give me the ball.”

“I’m not finished—”

“I answered your questions.”

“Yet, I remain dissatisfied.”

Red flashes before Din’s eyes. “What do you want from me?”

“ _Everything_ ,” Gavit growls.

A chill cuts through Din, so abrupt and startling that his heart almost stops. Gavit is many things, but cold he is not. His anger is like the heat waves on Nevarro — suffocating, consuming, and demanding to be felt _. But this… This is icier. Different._

“On second thought…” Gavit steps back, surveying the ball and the waste chute behind him. Din’s stomach drops. “I don’t think you need this _trinket_.”

“No.” The word catches in Din’s throat.

“What was that?” Gavit asks, relishing in the power shift. Din grits his teeth, refusing to acknowledge it, but the shift’s already begun. “You want it back? Then, confess.”

Din can feel himself shaking. He can’t just attack him, they both know that. Not without an outright provocation. _He forfeited his chance before._

“Confess!”

“I told you. I haven’t—” Din’s voice cracks. He struggles to find the words, _different words,_ but there aren’t any. “I haven’t… _done_ anything.”

“Well…” Gavit says. “You leave me no choice then.”

Din chokes. “No—”

He hurls the ball into the waste chute. It clinks against the rock as it falls, sending echoes ringing through the room. Din can barely hear himself breathing.

_It’s…gone._

Gavit approaches, leaning in. “You know why your dreams are fucked, Djarin?” He whispers so no one but Din can hear. “It’s because you’re an _ori'vhekad_.”

Din jerks, throat closing up. He doesn’t hear Gavit back away. Doesn’t register him addressing the watching crowd. Doesn’t hear anything beyond that slur, ringing dully in his ears like the ball in the chute.

 _Ori'vhekad_.

A word easily translated in Basic to mean: desert. But Mando’a isn’t like Standard; it thrives off of legend, imagery, and story. Their homeworld was decimated, reduced to a wasteland. Incapable of sustaining life. The slur speaks to that history; it speaks of one who depletes life and is as desolate and barren as the desert. _One in whom no life exists._

Gold armor turns to him and the white noise drops out. Din returns to himself, numb.

“What do you have to say for yourself?”

His vision swims, reddening.

“Speak—!”

Din whacks Gavit across the helm with his rifle so hard the balancing stock cracks. The crowd falls back as Gavit crashes into one of the tables. Din tosses the gun away and seizes him by the helm, ramming his knee in his face. A crunch echoes around the room.

Growling, Gavit wrestles him to the floor. Feet stumble away as they smash into a stack of food crates, sending the boxes toppling. Dust billows around them but Gavit’s armor glints through the cloud, giving away his attacks in flickers of gold light. His fist meets Din’s palm, vambrace strikes vambrace, armor slams against armor.

Gavit strikes out with his vibroblade and Din knocks it away. A jagged _shiv_ appears next and Din swipes it, flipping the dagger in one deft motion and driving it into his hand.

“Fuck!” Gavit lurches up, blood spurting out from the wound.

He lashes out blindly but Din pins his arm, drawing his own vibroblade in the same breath. The tip hovers over Gavit’s gut.

“Move, I dare you.”

Someone hurries forward, recognizing _what this is._ “Djarin.” _Sif._

“You…” Gavit swallows, panting. “You would…kill me? Over a ball?”

“ _Gladly_.”

“Djarin!”

This is way past a challenge, they know that now. With the right amount of force, _the right amount of give,_ Din can have Gavit’s entrails on the floor — a cesspool of shit, blood, and bile all spilling out. He’d die from his own waste system drowning him from the inside out.

It’s exactly what Din wants — for him to feel what this _nightmare_ has felt like all these years. _This grief, this rage, this sorrow._ It’s like drowning from the inside out.

Gavit shakes his head. “You’ve lost your mind.”

 _That’s not the only thing one of us is going to lose today._ The knife vibrates in Din’s hand, goading him to inflict the killing blow. He’s imagined this so many times — besting him, making Gavit _feel_ a fracture of his turbulent world.

Yet, he’s hesitating.

A shadow is spilling across Gavit’s helm and Din can’t look away from it, feeling a reminder break through his rage. _You promised…_

An ultimatum hangs over him.

 _Vengeance or fidelity._

“Go on, _wraith,_ ” Gavit hisses.

The nickname cuts through him, slackening Din’s grip around the hilt _just so_. He hasn’t heard that name since he was a teen in the Fighting Corps. It was meant to describe his combat style: the way he sprang from shadows as if emanating from the darkness itself, but the name had never been used as an insult. Not until now.

 _Maybe it is fitting._ Maybe he is a herald of death and gloom, looming over the promise of the Tribe. Maybe he is as unworthy as Gavit claims.

_But he made a promise…_

To be back by sunset with the ball.

To return to retrieve the kid.

To protect him.

He can’t be another person who fails the kid. _He won’t be._

Din’s nostrils flare as he leans back, panting. He can feel Sif hovering behind him in warning; the crowd around them, anticipating; Gavit’s helm fixed on him, _waiting_.

He grabs the _shiv_ ’s hilt and Gavit seizes under him.

“Don’t—”

Din wrenches it out, drawing a strangled cry from him as he tosses the dagger away. Blood gushes from Gavit’s wound, bleeding profusely now, but Din just sheaths his vibroblade, rising wordlessly. _He’ll get the message._

Gavit clutches at his palm, trembling with rage. They both know his hand is shot, even if he tends to the wound. They learned basic medic procedures together, and Din just botched one of the rules intentionally. _Never remove an impaled object from your body._ One can cut an artery, get an infection, lose _a hand_ that way.

That _would_ be unfortunate.

Din gathers up his damaged rifle, breaking through the circle to head to the waste chute.

“Where…” He hears Gavit stumble to his feet, breathing heavily behind him. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Din stills before the chute’s opening, staring into its dark abyss. It’s shaped like his incinerator, and Din can’t help but feel like he’s been here before. _Remembering_ something he’d intended to give to the kid. Gifts and trinkets. Sweet bread and knobs. Are they really so different?

It seems nothing has changed.

_And yet, everything has._

“To find what you so recklessly discarded,” Din says before heaving his body into the tunnel and sliding into darkness.

✵

“Why the hell do you smell like Bantha shit?” Peli swats at a fly, nose wrinkling as she eyes him up and down.

Din sighs, flicking a fruit peel off his shoulder and feeling some unidentifiable liquid drip off his armor when he moves.

“Where’s the kid?”

“Hopefully ripping out Treadwell’s wiring, so I can get a new droid,” she says, batting at the air. “He played with that new toy you bought him. Practically tired himself out.”

“Good.” A strain catches in his voice and Din clears his throat, eager to hide it. “That’s…very good.”

A concerned look flashes across her eyes. “Hey, what’s got your cogs all jammed?”

“Nothing.”

“Mando—”

“The kid. Would you get him for me?” Din swallows. “Please.”

Peli’s lips part, taken aback. “Sure. I mean, you don’t have to sound so polite about it. I mean this isn’t some upmarket ritz…”

Her voice disappears inside the tent and Din shifts his footing, scowling when water squelches in his boot. His gaze dips to the street if only to distract himself from the feeling. _Among others…_ The street lanterns are blinking on, setting off a chain reaction that has vendors turning over ‘Open’ signs and closing the curtains of their booths. There’s a sense of finality and satisfaction in the air. Of jobs well done.

It’s all quite normal, ordinary, almost boring. Yet, Din feels a strange stab of envy as he stands apart from the activity. He could never fit in here — not with the way it is now. The feeling brings with it an old taunt.

 _You’re weak._

_A coward._

_You don’t belong here._

Din thins his lips together, trying to stop a swell of emotion from crashing over him, but the emotion is already clawing its way out of his throat. Sorrow always shows up for him like a game of hide-and-seek. It goes in search of his voice first (because that’s the first thing he hides). Pushing out an inhuman sound — something brittle, strained, and taunt like a cord finally snapping. He won’t let it. _He can’t._

Din digs his fingers into his palm, trying to find his way back to solid ground, but he’s so tired. His rifle is broken and he smells terrible and he’s standing on sinking...

_Sand._

_Desert._

_Ori’vhekad._

A choked sound catches in his throat and Din bites his tongue, forcing it back down.

 _Not here,_ he pleads. _Not now._

“No, no, no. I need that back. Give—!” Din’s head whips up, hearing Peli before she officially emerges from the tent, shaking a micro-droid from the kid’s grubby hands. The child scrabbles for it, whining. She seizes the moment, pointing out. “Hey, ya little womp rat. Look who’s over there?”

“Hey, kid,” Din manages out.

The child’s ears fly up. He begins struggling in her arms, fussing when she takes too long to put him down.

“Okay, okay! Geez.”

Peli’s barely set him on the ground before the kid takes off, tripping over his own romper to stumble into Din’s legs. He rebounds off him a second later, wrinkling his nose.

“I know I stink.” Din turns to Peli, sighing. “Do you have one of those antiseptic packets?”

“I just wanna say if you think one packet is gonna clean all that up,” she says, gesturing to his armor. “You have another thing comin’.”

She hands one over anyway.

Din tugs at the tips of his glove and Peli suddenly becomes hyper-focused on a ship part, whistling under her breath. The decency is kind but unnecessary. Din rips open the packet with a clean hand, then feels around in his pocket.

 _It_ rolls into his palm.

“Here,” Din croaks after cleansing the ball with antiseptic. “I believe this is yours.”

The kid bounces on his feet as he takes the ball, rolling it in his hands.

“Well, looks like you’ve got all you came for,” Peli says, eying the carrier hovering behind him. Din had forgotten all about it. “Though I don’t understand why you had to come back looking like a drowned womp rat.”

“I…misplaced something.”

“Was it so important you needed to go through the Maker’s dregs to get it?” She snorts, rolling her eyes.

Din’s throat closes up as he stares at the kid.

_It was._

————

Before Din left the Armorer the first time he visited her with the kid, she said something that plagued him the rest of the day.

“Foundlings like this one are accustomed to being manipulated and lied to,” she said. “Captivity breeds mistrust. They come to expect having things taken from them all the time. You have stumbled upon a hard path indeed.”

It was those words that sent Din down the waste chute. That had him slipping and sliding over fruit peels. That made him rifle through the area, even as discarded food rained down on his helm. He was on his hands and knees, hurling stars-know-what into the darkness as her words turned over his mind. He couldn’t stop searching.

And searching.

And searching.

It didn’t matter how desperately he looked; guilt still hounded him (guilt is a severe fault line above all things —unimpressed by well-intentions or foolish mistakes— and Din felt it crack along his composure, leaving him fractured between remorse and terror). He should have pocketed the ball as soon as the kid had given it to him. He shouldn’t have let Gavit take it. _He should have been faster._

His hands searched.

Groping.

Aching.

At one point, he’d started to breathe so hard the modulator began staticing. His helm-lamp darted around, casting every mound under a harsh spotlight and Din felt like _he_ was the one under scrutiny. He had to find it. Needed to find it. _Wouldn’t be able to bear it if he turned up…_ He had nothing else to give the kid but his word and if the kid couldn’t even trust that, _what could he trust_?

His heart ached.

Trembling.

Unraveling.

 _Just a trinket_ , Gavit had called it. _Only a ball._

It wasn’t just that — _it never is—_ but Gavit wouldn’t understand. He was born and bred in the Tribe; he didn’t know what it was like to have so little to your name — to have few comforts and even fewer possessions.

But Din was born on Aq Vetina. Nothing ever truly belonged to him. Even the settlement —that inconspicuous place that wasn’t comfortable by any means, but was _home_ — was taken from him. Gavit had no idea what that was like. Everything’s always been handed to him, while everything has always been on the verge of slipping through Din’s fingers.

Din recognized that same history in the kid — in the way he clung to the ball and almost cried when it was taken away. The kid deserved so much more and Din didn’t have much to his name, but he did have that ball.

His hands searched around again.

Desperate.

Frenzied.

In the darkness, Din’s helm-lamp cut across a pool of orange liquid, to a half-eaten piece of bread, to molded leather meat, to—

 _Something glinting._

The light trailed back. Sitting in a mound of indiscriminate sludge was the kid’s ball. Din fell back on his hunches.

Exhaling.

Laughing.

Crying.

————

“I was a foundling once,” Din told her after she’d mentioned the kid’s trauma.

He didn’t know why he blurted it. Or why he revealed something so intimate in response.

Maybe it was a way of empathizing.

Maybe it was just a moment of self-disclosure.

Or maybe it was his way of telling her —albeit in a guarded, circumspect way— that he knew the path she spoke of. In fact, she was mistaken. He didn’t stumble upon a hard path. He was already on it.

_He never left._

Loss is a long and lonely road and Din knows every rock, every turn, every dip in the dirt. He can read it on a face. In a person’s body language. In the way it turns bright eyes sad.

It’s why he tried not to look the kid in the eye too often. But the attempt didn’t work in the end. Because even when Din was alone, standing in front of the old mirror in the ship, he found those same sad eyes staring back at him.

_I was a foundling once._

The Armorer stilled over the kiln then, helm tilting to him. “I know.”

————

There’s a weightlessness that comes with space travel.

An untethering.

One leaves the pull of time, customs, and planetary gravity (though Din still has to use his anti-gravity system in the ship, unless he wants his food drifting away) to enter a universe with laws all its own. There’s nothing stable or secure about it. No plot of solid ground in space.

Some find it disconcerting. Din just finds it liberating.

_Calming._

He doesn’t need an external system to keep time. The body is a clock — prone to setting its own rhythms with subtlety. It’s why when they finally take off from Nevarro, cruising through space on autopilot and he starts to feel a heaviness in his eyelids, he follows his body’s rhythm without a single protest. Din drags his feet (feeling a weariness in his body that can’t just be physical) and settles the kid into the hammock. His head barely hits the pillow before he’s out.

He can’t have been asleep for more than an hour when he’s awakened by steady whimpering. His eyes squint open, catching on the millaflowers hanging over him before he finds the hammock rustling from the ceiling.

Green arms flail out. The kid hiccups in his sleep and Din just sighs.

_A bad dream._

“Hey,” he croaks, rocking the hammock gently. “It’s just a dream.”

The kid’s body stiffens as he wakes and an inquisitive whine cries out, searching for him.

“I’m here,” he says.

A hand slides up the canopy belting, over Din’s knuckles, and curls around one of his fingers.

“Go back to sleep.” He rubs his thumb along the back of the kid’s hand.

A glint cuts across his viewfinder as he goes to lay back down. Light is spilling in through the open rack door — a testament to his tiredness. He can’t remember the last time he forgot to close it. Grumbling, Din traces a hand down the wall and stabs the access button.

The door seals shut with a hiss, enclosing them in darkness.

Instantly, a wail shrills in Din’s receiver.

His eyes fly open. “Shit!”

Din’s helm bangs against the ceiling as his hands search around blindly for the access button. His fingers catch on it and he’s out the rack before the door can finish rising, taking the kid with him. The kid’s wails expand and sharpen in the hold, reverberating off the walls. Din staggers to the side, stubbing his toe on a box. He stumbles away from it, only to stab his foot on a toy next.

“Dank farrick!”

The kid startles in his arms and goes from wailing to all-out screaming. Din’s heart leaps to his throat.

“What…what’s wrong?” he tries to ask over the cries.

Blubbering, the kid points at the rack.

“What—?” Din scans the sleeping compartment, the kid, then the button on the wall and flounders. “The dark? You’re afraid of the dark?”

The child merely bawls into his shoulder, smearing wet tears and snot along the fabric.

“I’m sorry. I…” Din worries his bottom lip. “I didn’t know.”

The kid’s breath hitches against him, steadily climbing in panic and Din hurries to the bench, terrified for another reason. 

“I need you to breathe. Can you do that for me?” he asks hastily.

Blunt teeth clamp down on his shoulder and Din barely stifles a curse. _This isn’t going well._

“I know you’re frightened, but you’ve got to breathe. You have to—”

A retching sound cuts him off and Din stiffens, feeling something warm and wet ooze down the back of his shoulder. He’s pretty sure it’s throw-up.

He shifts the kid and begins scrubbing the vomit off with his cape, thankful for the action if only because it'll give him time to think. He’s never had to comfort someone in this way. It’s usually best to avoid such things. People are finicky — what might calm one, might destabilize another. But the kid is damn-near-close to hyperventilating and the only frame of reference Din has for that is himself.

“Hey.” He inhales dramatically. “Do you feel that? Try to match my breathing.”

The kid does try, but his breath hitches again. A dejected hiccup bursts out of him.

“It’s okay,” Din soothes. “You can try again.”

Sniveling, the child makes another attempt, sucking in a slow, stuttering breath. His chest expands and it’s so damn promising, Din leans forward in his seat instinctively as if to encourage him more.

“That’s it. Now…” He exhales intentionally.

With an air of hesitancy, the kid mimics that too and Din runs a hand down his back, feeling relief course through him. “Very good. You’re doing so well.”

The child whimpers in reply.

“Let’s do it again.”

Din inhales and the child’s chest balloons with him; he exhales and the child deflates shakily, and thus the rhythm begins — with him leading the kid through an activity he’s had to do a thousand times. There was no one to teach him then. Only the constriction of his own lungs, pleading for air while refusing to take it. Din failed the exercise a dozen times, managed only half of the time, but tried _every time._

He didn’t know it could help another and yet, _it is._ He hears the kid’s breathing even out, slowly coming down from its ascent, and Din hums in affirmation.

“Good job, kid.”

He tilts his head and the child moves with him, rubbing his cheek against his helm.

Din softens. “I’m sure things have been hard,” he says. “But I want you to know it’s going to be—”

The word ‘okay’ falls from his lips.

_As it should._

He saw a medic on Kintoni offer such consolatory words to a dying man on the verge of burning from the inside out; it had rubbed Din the wrong way even then. The medic was lying to the man, telling him everything would ‘be alright’ when it clearly wasn’t going to be.

Din is many things but a liar, he is not. He isn’t one to make false promises, neither does he believe in speaking falsehoods for comfort’s sake. He’s felt anxiety’s sting more than once; the last thing he ever felt in those moments was ‘okay’. But words of reassurance are instinctive. The Tribe offered such consolations to him when he was in his twenties (when the nightmares were still fresh and new and unexpectedly terrifying). Their words, though different from the medic’s, had the same tenor, the same tone, the same assumption.

_That everything, in the end, would be okay._

But no one can know that for certain.

Life is brutal in the Outer Rim, devouring the weak and hounding the strong. Children are always lost in the middle of such chaos. They’re resilient enough to survive, but vulnerable enough to crumble under all that survival requires of them. Sometimes children are forced to shed their childhood light years too early, and sometimes life makes orphans out of them. It’s just the way of the universe, but that doesn’t make it okay. He doesn’t want to normalize such hard realities — leading the kid to think that displacement and terror and _being frightened all the time_ are normal.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “About the lights.”

 _For frightening you,_ is what he really means to say (because Din’s mistake hurt him and that’s not okay, even if it was an accident).

The kid just sniffles miserably.

“It can get pretty dark in here. I’m…not used to having anyone else around, so I forget it might be uncomfortable for others. I can change some things. Or install some low-grade illuminators? That way you could click them on?”

He bites his lip, waiting on a response. The child is silent against him and Din feels his nervousness spike.

“Or not. You don’t have to use them. I just thought—”

A hand tightens around his collar. Din falters, forgetting for a moment what he’d intended to say.

“I just thought…you might like them.”

There’s a smallness in his voice that he doesn’t recognize. There’s also an incredibly small child — _the kid—_ clinging to him and Din doesn’t recognize _that_ either.

He doesn’t know how to explain such experiences. So, his mind trails to the kid’s proximity instead and the odors he’s bound to be picking up; things like sweat and musk, antiperspirant and harsh decontaminate from the wash-up. There’s nothing pleasant, nothing calming or kind about such scents, and Din wishes he could offer better solace.

But he’s a man wearing impenetrable armor. How could anyone find comfort against that?

“I know everything’s scary and you probably don’t like this setup. I’m sure you miss your family,” Din says and it’s the closest thing to saying _‘I know I’m not them’_ that he can manage. “You can feel scared. Or feel anything. It’s…okay to be sad, you know. More than okay, actually.”

Din chews the inside of his cheek, feeling uncommonly insecure. It’s hard trying to articulate something he’s never heard, has never seen, but maybe…at one point, _wished_ he’d been told when he was younger and more temperamental, fielding all his rage and grief into his runs with Xi’an and the crew. He didn’t know what to do with such emotions then. All he knew was that he was unraveling, on the verge of bursting at the seams, because he was _so terribly_ afraid. Of what those emotions would do to him. Of what they’d _undo_ in him.

He kept longing for permission then. For someone to tell him it was okay to let go. The kid doesn’t need his permission, but he still can’t help offering it. Pain can be awfully lonely and he doesn’t want the kid thinking he’s alone in all this.

Din can’t speak for the future —of what will and won’t be— but he can address the present. Even if things aren’t alright, that doesn’t mean _they_ can’t be.

“We’re okay,” he says. _Right now. In this moment_. “I hope you know that.”

The kid finally leans back from his shoulder. His eyes are puffy and red-rimmed, and there are old tears smeared across his cheeks. He looks so pointedly miserable Din doesn’t know what else to do except wipe the tears away.

He feels the urge to say more. Something. _Anything._ But words have never been his strong suit; it’s easier to communicate with his hands. Besides, the kid doesn’t use words either. He just communicates with—

Din stills.

 _Gestures_.

He sets the kid on his lap, eliciting a whine that’s only quelled when he stutters: “Hold on, please just—” He exhales, licks his lips, hesitates.

Then—

 _Signs_.

“We’re _,_ ” Din enunciates, drawing a circle in the air between them, then signs two letters afterward, “okay.” He looks the kid in the eye _for once_ and accepts all the sadness he sees there. “We’re okay.”

For a while, the kid just stares at his hands and Din can’t help but chew on his lip, eying the kid every few seconds to see if there’s a response. When there still is none, even after whole minutes have gone by, his gaze falls away.

_Why did he even—?_

A hand moves out of the corner of Din’s eye. He sucks in a breath, holding it tight when the kid draws a circle between the two of them. It’s clumsy and the form’s a bit off, but Din knows what he’s saying anyway and suddenly, he doesn’t know where his wonder ends and where it begins.

The kid peeks up at him shyly.

“That’s it.” Din nods encouragingly

He spells out the last sign, making it deliberately easy. It’s easier still for a child with only three fingers. The kid hesitates and waits for him to do it twice more before mimicking again.

“Good! That’s…” Din chokes out a laugh. “That’s very good.”

The child practically preens under the praise, wet-eyed but eager to imitate the signs again and Din can’t stop himself from grinning — in astonishment, in gratitude, in _awe_. He doesn’t know why he didn’t think of it before. The kid typically prefers physical touch and direct actions, while dismissing speech altogether. He understands words, sure, but he rarely seems to care for them — only when they’re paired with action.

Din could laugh at himself. He thought he needed to change; he thought the kid wanted him to talk more; he thought he needed to become something else.

He had no idea the kid was perfectly fine with all of it.

With silence and gestures, short sentences and encouraging touches.

With Din just…being himself.

“We’re okay,” the kid signs eagerly.

“Yes,” Din signs back. “We are.”

 _But you deserve so much more than that_.

He wants to say as much, but he can’t. He has no right to have hopes and dreams for a child that doesn’t belong to him. Still, he can’t help _but_ have them. ‘Okay’ is a baseline for now, but there are worlds beyond that emotional state. The kid deserves to smile, to know a full stomach and an even fuller heart, to be with someone who loves him.

The kid deserves to be _happy._

“I’ll get you back home. To your kind,” Din promises. “I’m sure someone’s been waiting a long time for you…”

The child just snuggles against his stomach with a trust that feels almost unearned. His eyes droop and Din gets the message, standing to head back to the rack.

He sidesteps a cluster of toys, angling around the box he tripped over earlier, before lowering the kid into the hammock. As he goes to slide his hands out from under him, the child whimpers, beginning to stir.

“Shh, shh, shh,” Din soothes, caressing his head. The kid’s eyes flutter closed as he leans into the touch, gradually going quiet.

But the noise in Din’s mind does not pipe down, even when he settles back into the rack. It’s a chaotic, frittering sound — one he usually stifles with his hands — badgering him with incessant musings.

For as long as Din can remember, he’s been an enigma. An abnormality. He’s made peace with not having answers. He doesn’t need them. But somehow, he’s stumbled upon a kid whose presence is just as much of a shock as it is a mystery.

Maybe, he doesn’t need answers for that either. But he _does_ know what he’s going to do.

He’s going to get the kid back where he belongs. It’s time to put a stop to this current of misery the kid’s been swept up in. He’ll fight against the tide if he has to.

_Or, at the very least, die trying._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And thus ends the second installment. Thank you for reading. If you've got any reactions, thoughts, observations, post them in the comment section below.
> 
> Now, for those like me who love understanding character development, motivations, plot themes, and such, the info below is my nerdy-brain nerding out as it does (feel free to skip it if it's not your cup of tea):
> 
>  **Communication Between Din and Grogu:** One thing I think is super special about Din and Grogu's relationship is _how_ they communicate. Din can speak but oftentimes chooses not to; Grogu doesn't speak (in the show that is) and yet is nonverbally chatty. I really wanted to highlight that dynamic in this story, while trying to subvert some ableist assumptions. All forms of communication are valid -- verbal and nonverbal. More, communication can look different for each relationship depending on what each person needs. I wanted to highlight that reality in this story, but principally in this chapter. Din has been hounded with questions his whole life (e.g. about his dreams) while also being given unwanted suggestions/consolations (e.g. it'll be okay). So, in his interactions with Grogu, he doesn't demand that the kid respond verbally, neither does he press him to 'get over' his childhood fears. He just affirms and adjusts _because_ he understands (e.g. this is juxtaposed in his scene with Gavit when Gavit yells at him to 'speak' and Din responds with action). Compared to the hunters, Din doesn't ask Grogu to be more than what he is. Likewise, compared to members in the Tribe, Grogu doesn't ask Din to be more than what he is. This is honestly my favorite dynamic in the show and, hopefully, something I can tease out more in this story.
> 
>  **A Brief Note about American Sign Language, Writing Traumatic Mutism, & Ableism:** Any sign-language communication between Grogu and Din will be depicted in quotations. I do not experience mutism. Nevertheless, I've been learning from other humans who experience mutism; they've taught me that italicized sign-language in fiction depicts the language as other (which I seriously want to avoid). So, keep an eye out for the dialogue tags. Also, to make a distinction: traumatic mutism is different from selective mutism. With selective mutism, individuals struggle to speak in certain environments, and their mutism isn't always predicated on some type of trauma. With traumatic mutism, individuals stop speaking in all environments following a traumatic event. I want to stress that nothing is _wrong_ with Grogu for not speaking verbally. Yes, he's experienced trauma, but he's not "defective" or "in need of fixing". He's just been through a hard time (as Din also has). 
> 
> Until next time!

**Author's Note:**

> Come have tea with me on [tumblr.](https://muchadoloo.tumblr.com/)


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